


Twin Blasters

by wickersnap



Series: Of the things I have to tell you [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Anakin Skywalker Doesn't Turn to the Dark Side, Anakin Skywalker Needs a Hug, BAMF Anakin Skywalker, Established Relationship, Minor Character Death, Multi, Order 66, Palps tortures them a bit, RotS AU, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies, That's Not How The Force Works, WARNING for some suicidal thoughts or implications, but only some ;), canon character death, clone cameos, rating and warnings for canon-typical violence and minor torture (by palps)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-28
Updated: 2020-09-24
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:14:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,404
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26159362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wickersnap/pseuds/wickersnap
Summary: What if things were slightly askew? What if, with a few tweaks, the pieces were unseated and nobody knew?What if, on the off-chance, it lets a few suspicions loose?“General, sir,” Rex interrupts.Anakin swallows. “Captain?”“We’re ready to take the Count into custody to await his trial by the Senate.”
Relationships: CT-7567 | Rex/Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi & Anakin Skywalker, Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker, Padmé Amidala/CT-7567 | Rex, Padmé Amidala/CT-7567 | Rex/Anakin Skywalker
Series: Of the things I have to tell you [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1899607
Comments: 54
Kudos: 248





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew, so, this got immediately out of hand. Considering this incredibly selfish au started with me thinking about codywan... yeah. Well, I really hope you enjoy it!  
> (me, faced with most canonical character deaths: I pretend I do not see it)
> 
> Important context: In one slight change, Obi-Wan did not lie to Anakin, Cody and Ahsoka when faking his death in the Rako Hardeen arc. (Anakin was rattled enough by the pretence that he made it convincing anyway)  
> ALSO while rex & ahsoka's partnership is v important to me (I promise) I just really wanted to see what I could do by adding rex(anidala) to rots. Am I a little obsessed with rexwalker rn? No, I'm a lot obsessed. No apologies though.

“I sense great _fear_ in you, Skywalker,” Dooku says—snarls, really—as they circle each other, sabers crossed in a blinding barrier between them. “You have hate, you have _anger…_ But you don’t use them.”

Anakin grunts as he shoves against Dooku’s hold, not caring in the least for what he has to say. Yes, he has hate; who wouldn’t hate the man who cut off his arm, repeatedly attacked, harmed and and plotted against his Master, wife, Padawan and men, and orchestrated a war? Yes, he has anger; that man is standing right in front of him, _gloating._ He curls the palm of his left hand over the end of his saber and twists out of Dooku’s grip, breaking their stance and forcing him back. 

No, he doesn’t use them, because he is a _Jedi._

Dooku stumbles. Anakin strides forward and raises his saber over his head to rain down a new slew of attacks, advancing them over the floor of the observation deck in two blurs of blue and red. They near the Chancellor captive on his prisoner’s throne and Anakin swerves them away, forcing Dooku back again before lunging in and spinning succinctly to catch each and every Sith-damned blow. 

He sees his chance—takes it, immediately and literally. He grabs the Count’s hands folded over his lightsaber grip and swings up in a wide, unforgiving arc. The hands beneath his drop to the ground, dead weight, and Dooku gasps in agony. With a small nudge to the Force, the Count’s saber sails into his open palm and Dooku falls to his knees, stilled and shocked by the fresh, blackened stumps of his wrists. Anakin reignites his red blade, shuddering with disgust in the back of his mind at the feel of its tortured kyber, and crosses both sabers over the prominence of the Count’s neck. He has won.

“Good, Anakin, good!” chuckles the Chancellor from behind them. The sound of his relief and gratitude lends a valve release to Anakin’s sizzling anger, his disturbing lust for blood, and it falls gradually away with every heave of his lungs. Above them, the clattering thuds of a dozen sets of footsteps echo over the mezzanine.

“General!” comes a greeting shout. “We’re making our way through the upper levels!”

Anakin does not look up from Dooku, unwilling to split his attention so blatantly in the face of a Sith Lord. Even _he_ is not that stupid, nor that arrogant, whatever Master Windu may say.

“Good work, Rex,” he says, and for the first time since they crash-landed in the hangar he feels a smile working its way up onto his lips. “Master Obi-Wan is injured. Have someone see to him as soon as you can.”

“Right away, sir,” Rex replies. Anakin can feel sparks of worry cascading from each of the troopers above them at the mention of Obi-Wan. Now that he thinks about it, the void of emotion seated in the Chancellor’s robes is most prominent. A thought for another time, he concludes, still staring down the pained and shell-shocked expression of the old and greying Count.

“Anakin,” the Chancellor commands, hardening his voice to regain Anakin’s attention. “Kill him.”

_What?_

Count Dooku startles. Anakin frowns down at him, watches him look to Palpatine and back up in fear. The glow of the crossed sabers makes him look sickly, feverish, and the onslaught of contradictory input is beginning to make Anakin’s head spin.

“Kill him _now.”_

“I shouldn’t,” Anakin refutes. “I am a Jedi, and he is unarmed.”

 _“Do it,”_ Palpatine sneers.

“General, sir,” Rex interrupts.

Anakin swallows. “Captain?”

“We’re ready to take the Count into custody to await his trial by the Senate.”

“Kill him!” The Chancellor orders again.

Anakin wets his lips and considers the man at his feet again. He reaches out in the Force for Rex and clings to his steady confidence, his steadfastness, so much like an anchor in the raging seas of Kamino. The confusion and nausea within him quells, and his resolve becomes clear once again.

“My apologies, Chancellor,” he says, “but I will not kill an unarmed man. It is not the way of the Jedi.”

He steps back from Dooku, raising two fingers from the hilt of his saber to command the Force to hold the Sith Lord in place. Obi-Wan’s men rush in to restrain him, yanking him to his feet when Anakin releases him and leading him, glaring, from the observation spire.

“Anakin, my boy, do you really think this a wise decision?” Palpatine asks pleadingly. “Do you not think Dooku strong enough to overpower your men? He will only escape again—surely you know this.”

Anakin steps up to the chair and waves a hand to release the Chancellor’s bindings. “If I may, Chancellor, it was not my decision to make,” he says. “He was an unarmed prisoner. I will not take another life in that manner, it’s not right.”

Palpatine rises quickly from the chair, visibly angry though Anakin feels blind to him in all other senses. “He is dangerous, my boy, do you not see? Did you not see what he did to your Master, what he has done to the galaxy in this war?”

Anakin turns his gaze to where Obi-Wan is slowly coming around under the attentions of his men. “I stand by my decision.”

Palpatine sighs. He runs absent fingers over his wrists as he begins with purpose towards the door. “We must leave, before any other security arrives.”

“Are you all right, Master?” Anakin asks, jogging over to Obi-Wan and kneeling by his side. Obi-Wan struggles to sit up, thrown off-balance by the sudden, splitting explosions that rock the ship.

“Fine, Anakin,” he replies, and it’s only somewhat strangled. “Go, protect the Chancellor. We shall be right behind you.”

“Sir,” Boil nods as Anakin checks with him before rising again to his feet.

“Make sure that you are.”

“Sir, the lifts are jammed,” Rex reports as they flank the Chancellor on their way to the lift exchange. 

“Great,” Anakin mutters, reaching into his belt for his com and tapping the link open. “Artoo, activate elevator three-two-two-four.”

Artoo chirps on the other end. Several more blasts shudder through the ship, and Anakin becomes all the more aware of their precarious location. Without any more warning than one rolling wave of destruction, hundreds of levels below, the floor beneath them tilts dangerously quickly as the ship drops into a steep nosedive. 

“Sirs!” someone behind them shouts. Anakin yelps and reaches out to grab hold of one of Rex’s vambraces with one hand and the Chancellor’s arm with the other.

“Hold on, sir!” Rex shouts, fumbling at his utility belt amidst muffled swearing. They stumble for purchase on the slippery metal sheeting, tilting dangerously towards the lift doors in a way that has Anakin picturing them hanging from them like strung fish. “Damn it!” Rex curses, and gives up on whatever he was looking for. He slams one hand on the outstanding panel and grips fast, turning the other to take better hold of Anakin’s arm. He and the Chancellor pry open the doors and haul themselves (and Anakin, dangling sort of uselessly) into the lift shaft just in time for the walls to become the floor. Anakin spares a thought for Obi-Wan and the rest of their men back in the observatory.

Well, at least this makes the long climb down a little more… straight-forward. 

The three of them begin the long run down the dark and precarious shaft. Far behind them echoes the sound of several grappling wires thudding into durasteel, quickly followed by the appearance of their men at the entrance to the shaft.

“Follow on!” Obi-Wan’s voice rings out, but Anakin can’t spare another glance back to check on his condition: someone, somewhere up on the control deck, finally gets the ship’s emergency boosters blasting. 

The floor-walls begin to tilt again, this time tipping them _towards_ where they need to be, but quite unfortunately catapulting them into a dangerous slide downwards. Anakin digs his heels into the metal walls, wary of the hundreds of nooks and depressions liable to break his ankles, and waits until the Chancellor has sufficient grip on his leg to catch hold of the next outcropping of wires. Their fall breaks with an abrupt wrench but the wires hold firm; Rex has finally untangled his grappling wire and attached it to his blaster sight, firing it into the wall a few metres above Anakin’s head.

“Are you all right there, sirs?” he asks, perfectly calm, as if he hadn’t been the one most at risk of falling to his death.

Faint yelling from above grows rapidly louder as they hang there. Within the moment several blurs of white-and-gold armour go zipping past, each a mess of flailing limbs and clattering plastoid. One collides with Rex, prompting a pained ‘Oomph!’ from both parties, and clings to him, snatching the arm of another passing vod and beginning a ridiculous chain of men down the lift shaft. Another, softer blur of white drops almost straight onto Anakin’s head and latches onto his other leg, nearly wrenching it out of his socket as his fall breaks.

 _“Yep,”_ Anakin replies, belated and winded and biting back a shout. _“All good here.”_

Fortunately enough, the men below them have managed to reinstate their grapples or find some purchase on the walls. It doesn’t look like they’ve lost anyone, and for that, Anakin is thankful.

“Apologies, Anakin,” Obi-Wan says a little breathlessly. He flicks his gleaming red hair out of his eyes and looks up at Anakin from where he’s wrapped around his waist. “You know I’d usually warn you before dropping in like that, but the circumstances _were_ a little extreme.”

Anakin doesn’t roll his eyes, and he definitely doesn’t laugh. He turns his attention to the Chancellor instead, shifting his grip on the cables and thanking the Force for the strength of his false arm. “Are you all right, Chancellor?”

“As well as can be expected, I suppose,” Palpatine replies mildly. He doesn’t look concerned at all, and it stabs a sliver of irritation through Anakin’s concentration.

Another noise from above startles everyone into another panic. Anakin gazes up in horror at the approaching lift, fumbling once again for his communicator and thumbing it on.

“Artoo, Artoo! Shut down the elevator!”

“Too late!” Obi-Wan shouts. “Everyone—jump!”

As one, the unit detaches themselves from the wall. Anakin releases his grip on the wire and begins his free fall, anxious for the Chancellor below him who has no possible way of saving himself. The lift grinds over the durasteel just metres above his head, chasing them like trapped womp rats down the shaft.

“HERE!” someone yells, and Anakin watches as their men begin disappearing through an open lift door below with impressive effort. The ledge is approaching, he can see the last few of the 212th preparing to lever themselves through, but it isn’t until he senses Obi-Wan’s desperate idea that he remembers his _own_ grappling wire tucked neatly in his pocket.

“REX, GRAB ON!” he shouts, unlatching his sight and lining up next to Obi-Wan. He feels rather than sees Rex take his old Master’s place at his waist, and just in time, too: the wires wrap themselves neatly around a nearby girder and they force the drag to a halt, swinging themselves (and Anakin’s two passengers) right through the open door. 

They hit the floor hard. All of the breath is forced from Anakin’s lungs, and he’s pretty sure he’s going to have wrist strain for the rest of the day. His legs are bent at odd angles thanks to his hangers-on, but other than that he feels relatively undamaged, if a little loose at the joints.

“Let’s see if we can find something in that hangar bay that’s still flyable,” Obi-Wan suggests, leaping up to his feet without preamble.

“Sir,” groans Peel, “you need to take it easy on that leg.”

“My leg is fine,” he replies distractedly. “Our priority is the Chancellor. Now… How to get off this ship…”

“You all right, Rex?” Anakin asks. Rex pauses in readjusting his pauldron to extend an arm out to him.

“Perfect, General. Thanks for the catch.”

Anakin grins and takes his hand gently, revelling in the curl of his fingers through his Captain’s. “Any time.”

“Artoo, get down here as soon as you can,” he hears Obi-Wan say into his com. “Artoo? Do you copy?”

“Guess we’ll just have to wait and see,” Anakin sighs. “Chancellor, if you’ll come with us, we can see if we can make our way off this ship.”

“Of course,” Palpatine agrees.

“Sir, Count Dooku confirmed in holding on our boarding ship.”

“Thank you, Crys, good job,” Obi-Wan says. “At least that’s one less problem to worry about. I sure hope they didn’t have any problems getting him there.”

The corridor in front of them is long and looks exactly like every other corridor on every other Separatist ship. Anakin and Obi-Wan take point, the Chancellor between them and their men for safety, and yet it still comes as a surprise, when halfway towards the doors at the other end, circulating white filmy energy barriers spring up at even intervals all around them.

“Ray shields!” Anakin blurts in surprise. Yes, well done General Obvious. Any more pertinent observations to share?

He looks around at his Master and the Chancellor, trapped in the same bubble as him. A cluster of the 212th are trapped a little ways away, but Rex and Waxer are circling them warily, blasters drawn, as Boil races to the nearest control panel.

“Wait a minute,” says Obi-Wan, looking disgruntled. “How did this happen? Surely we’re smarter than this.”

“Apparently not,” Anakin drawls dryly. “Boil, can you get these down?”

“Working on it sir!”

“Well… I’m sure Artoo will be along in a few moments to assist you.”

With almost perfect theatrical timing, a door a little ways down the corridor hisses open to emit the sound of screaming astromech. Artoo comes careening through at full speed, colliding with the opposite wall and bouncing backwards with a startled squeak.

“See,” Anakin says. “No problem.”

A pair of droidekas roll in uninvited after Artoo, settling and unfolding themselves in the middle of the corridor. Rex and Waxer whip around and open fire, but it’s already too late—their shields are up and a squadron of battle droids has just turned the corner, joined in short order by an infuriating number of B2s.

 _“Damn_ these clankers!” Waxer mutters. Behind them, another platoon’s worth of B2s is marching down on them. They duck between the shield bubbles for cover, and Anakin watches them with increasing anxiety.

“Don’t move,” one B2 commands Artoo. Artoo, who extends a nimble limb and electrocutes its aiming arm with great reproach. The droid yelps and kicks him in retaliation, toppling the much shorter astromech in a cruel display of violence.

“Surrender, Republic dogs!” orders the squadron commander.

“Lay your weapons down,” Anakin decides instantaneously, his heart leaping into his throat at the sight of Rex cocking his blasters in preparation to take on the whole damn _army._

“Do you have a _Plan B?”_ Obi-Wan enquires most unhelpfully. Anakin is tempted to kick him. Tempted, but not suicidal. 

(Not quite).

* * *

Unsurprisingly, they’re taken to the bridge to face General Grievous. The walk is long, but less dangerous than their escapade down the lift shaft, and the droids are yet to turn their blasters on Rex or the 212th, and so Anakin is okay to settle for this. 

The bridge, when they get there, is surprisingly small. It’s highlighted and drenched in acidic green light from the control panels and, for some reason, the actual floor-level lighting. In the middle of the floor is one large throne-like chair, fixed in place and filled by, presumably, the captain of the ship. Anakin can’t say any of their interior design is really doing it for him. He guesses this is what you get when you delegate everything to an army of droids with half a circuit to share between them.

“Ah yes,” greets whom he can easily assume to be General Grievous as he, Obi-Wan and the Chancellor are lead to stand in front of the throne. “The Negotiator. General Kenobi, we’ve been waiting for you.”

Anakin glares as he passes. Grievous: a man— _droid_ —he hates almost as much as Dooku.

“Excuse me,” says the command droid that has their sabers as it edges past Obi-Wan and Artoo to Grievous. Anakin finds a spare thought in the back of his mind to find this particularly hilarious, if stupid.

“That wasn’t much of a rescue,” Grievous jeers. _Yeah, as if any of your operations have gone any better._ The droid offers the lightsabers to Grievous, who snatches them out of its palm without looking.

“You’re welcome,” the stupid thing says as it backs away, having the gall to sound _offended._

“And—” the General pauses to cough heartily, “—Anakin Skywalker.”

Anakin looks up at him, waiting. Grievous wanders into his face, hunched and gritty like you’d never believe.

“I was expecting someone with your reputation to be a little… _older.”_

Anakin purses his lips in a brief attempt to keep his irritation and contempt in check. “General Grievous,” he says, and can’t keep the smirk off his face. “You’re shorter than I expected.”

The General coughs again, still too close, and spits out, “Jedi scum.”

“We have a job to do Anakin, try not to upset him,” Obi-Wan says. 

Oh yes, just because he doesn’t get the pathetic insult politics…

Artoo beeps impudently and sits back on his rollers, and Anakin can’t help but agree with him. Grievous chuckles as he wanders back towards the central command deck, obviously uncaring for whatever they have to say.

“Your lightsabers will make a fine addition to my collection,” he says, and tucks them very visibly into the inside pocket of his cloak. Anakin begins to wonder how carrying them around like that doesn’t feel constantly unbalanced, but then decides he doesn’t care. Those are the lightsabers of his _friends._

“Not this time,” Obi-Wan says. “And _this_ time, you won’t escape.”

“Artoo!” Anakin signals. Artoo responds immediately, opening all of his compartment doors and sending out a high-voltage discharge that arcs right into the nearest battle droids. Anakin and Obi-Wan use the distraction to summon back their lightsabers and break through their bonds.

“Crush them!” Grievous shouts, and immediately a whining alarm begins to blare over the sound system. The two magnaguards flanking him ignite their purple staffs and clump forward, already twirling them menacingly. “Make them suffer!”

Anakin turns to cut through the nearest rank of battle droids while Obi-Wan engages the magnaguards. He sees their men scramble in the back, making good use of the confusion to snatch their weapons out of the hands of surprised droids and start picking off the ones still seated at the ship’s helm or protecting the Chancellor. One magnaguard slips past Obi-Wan’s guard and Anakin attacks it head-on before it can get the jump on either of them. 

The guard flourishes its staff, perfectly meeting each and every one of Anakin’s strikes. It pushes him back towards the closed doors of the bridge and, incidentally, the two 212th troopers leading the Chancellor to (hopefully) safety. 

Just barely over its shoulder he can see the second one scuffling with Obi-Wan dangerously close to the transparisteel viewports. He sees him take its head off, but then his own guard is forcing him out of the doors after the Chancellor and he finds himself locked in a rapid, bone-shaking exchange of blows that has him bending over backwards under the thing’s considerable height until he can slice it in half. The two halves clatter to the ground, limp and deactivated, and give him a clear view of the final impressive swirls of his Master’s saber through the beheaded droid.

“Don’t bother with them!” Grievous growls at the few remaining droids as Anakin reenters the bridge. “Keep the ship in orbit!”

He skips over the bank of terminals and lands over the destroyed guard, snatching its staff just in time for Anakin and Obi-Wan to pincer him from either side. Anakin watches him glance between them with a sinking feeling in his chest. They raise their sabers to attack positions, but Grievous turns towards the transparisteel.

“You lose, General Kenobi,” he says, and thrusts the staff straight into it. The energised tip cracks and splinters the pane, spidery fractures growing across it until the whole thing shatters and is ripped into the void of the battle. Anakin leaps to grab hold of the console bank behind him and feels Obi-Wan do the same, both scanning what they can see of the bridge for anyone in danger. After several too-long seconds the blast shields clamour shut over each half of the viewport and the pressure levels out once more. Everyone drops back to the floor with a sigh of relief; Anakin fights the cramp in his organic fingers from his adrenaline-fuelled clutching. Grievous has ejected himself, but Anakin doubts he won’t come back for an escape ship.

The Captain of the ship flees past them. Anakin signals for the men to let them go—they aren’t important. Several blaster shots and a couple of slices later, the bridge is battle droid-free, but another round of much more worrisome explosions wracks the ship. A nearby monitor bleeps loudly.

“All the escape pods have been launched,” Anakin says, glancing over it with apprehension.

“Grievous,” Obi-Wan surmises. “Can you fly a cruiser like this?”

Anakin huffs sardonically and moves to take the forcibly-vacated pilot’s seat. “You mean, do I know how to fly what’s left of this thing.”

“Well?”

“Well, under the circumstances, I’d say the ability to pilot this thing is irrelevant.” He flicks on all of the preparatory controls and studies the console for half a tick. The kriffing alarms are still going. “You’d better all strap yourselves in.”

Beside him Obi-Wan makes no move to really do more than clip his acceleration belt on, but then again the Chancellor is insisting on standing at his shoulder. Well, he did warn them. He’s grateful, at least, for Rex taking up position in the seat on his other side.

“Open all hatches, extend all flaps and drag fins.”

“All functional, sir.”

The Chancellor finally decides to allow himself to be shuffled into a seat and strapped in. Artoo beeps, unimpressed, and the worst explosion yet throws them forward in their seats. Anakin watches in dismay as the entire rear half of the ship drops offline. Even the Chancellor could understand Artoo’s little ‘Uh-oh’.

“We lost something,” Anakin says redundantly. Gulps. 

“Not to worry,” Obi-Wan murmurs. “We are still flying _half_ a ship.”

The bridge shudders and begins to glow as they skim the surface of Coruscant’s atmosphere and begin their uncontrolled descent.

“We really are picking up speed,” he mutters to himself.

“You can say that again,” Rex adds under his breath.

He can see the slipstream burning white hot outside the undamaged transparisteel. Something breaks away from the hull in front of them and flies off into space.

“Eight plus sixty,” Obi-Wan reports.

“We’re in the atmosphere—grab that, keep us level.”

That’s an understatement. They’re coming up fast on one of the main city circles. It’s not exactly ideal, but he’ll do his best.

“Steady,” Obi-Wan says.

“Sir, we’re not going to be able to slow down in time for any semblance of a safe landing,” Rex tells him. Several smaller ships swoop in at their nine o’clock.

“Five-thousand,” Obi-Wan reports again. “Fire ships on the left and the right.” Yes, very helpful, he’s sure. The coms crackle, and Obi-Wan opens the connection.

“We’ll take you in,” says a helmet-modulated voice.

“Copy that,” Obi-Wan replies. “Landing strip, straight ahead!”

Yet another alarm has begun to blare in the background. Can Anakin see that the ship is crashing? Yes, he’s fairly sure anyone with a brain could at least _feel_ it, thank you, and he is doing— _his—best_ to get a handle on their speed and trajectory.

“We’re coming in too hot,” he admits. They’re barely any distance from the landing strip and still going at top speeds, though he’s shocked they actually made it to one at all.

The domed underside of the cruiser crumples the instant it touches down. Again they’re all thrown forward into their acceleration belts, but manage to keep from throwing up their lungs. Well, he assumes they all do. He can never tell with the buckets.

Unable to properly steer the cruiser as they skid across the steel, Anakin winces as they take out one of the nearby control towers. He hopes it was unmanned—it certainly is now. Eventually the friction of shrieking metal slows them down enough to come to a listing stop, gritting their teeth and cringing at every single jolt. 

A collective breath is released throughout the room when the Force-damned thing finally stops moving. Anakin releases his stiff grip on the panel edge and looks from Rex (relieved, stressed, and sweating) to Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan runs a hand through his disorderly hair and tries for a smile.

“Another happy landing,” he says. 

Anakin _really_ wants to kick him.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one's a bit weird, seeing as it’s all the necessary parts of rots I don't really like because you can see it all going wrong and I’m weak. This time around we’ve some (hopefully) interesting changes! Let's pray we make some better decisions this time...

The transport that takes them to the Senate is met by what feels like a quarter of the building’s occupancy. Chancellor Palpatine steps off readily as soon as the door opens, and Anakin pauses to look at Rex.

“Accompany me?” he asks.

Rex nods in his helmet, though Anakin knows he’s smiling underneath. “Always, General.”

“Well, someone needs to tell Cody we survived,” Obi-Wan says, glancing over his platoon. “Go back to your barracks, men, get some rest. You’ve earnt it.”

“Yes, sir,” Waxer replies, snapping off a salute. He and the rest of the 212th relax back into seats near the back of the transport, and Anakin smiles as he makes to disembark. He notices a few paces away that Obi-Wan hangs back on the transport deck.

“Are you coming, Master?” he asks.

“Oh no,” Obi-Wan chuckles. “I’m not brave enough for politics.” A bold-faced lie if ever he heard one. “I have to report to the Council. Besides, someone needs to be the poster boy.”

Rex barely smothers a snicker as Anakin splutters and levels an accusatory finger at his Master. 

“Hold on,” he says, “this whole operation was your idea!”

Obi-Wan hums, smiling the way he does when he knows he’s already won. “Let us not forget, Anakin, that it was  _ you _ who rescued  _ me _ from the buzz droids—and you captured Count Dooku,  _ and _ you rescued the Chancellor, all while I was unconscious on the floor.”

“All because of your training,” Anakin retorts, barely suppressing a grin himself.

“Anakin, let’s be fair. Today you were the hero, and you deserve your glorious day with the politicians!”

Anakin glances in the direction of Obi-Wan’s wide sweep of his arm. Yes, a glorious day indeed if that’s what awaits him.

“All right,” he relents. “But you owe me one! And not for saving your skin for the tenth time.”

_ “Ninth _ time, Anakin,” Obi-Wan is quick to correct, however incorrectly. “That business of Cato Nemoidia doesn’t—doesn’t count. I’ll see you at the briefing.”

Anakin and Rex nod their goodbyes as Obi-Wan makes his way back into the transport. The engines whine as the door closes and it lifts off from the landing platform. They join the procession behind various senators as the Chancellor makes his way over to meet with Master Windu.

“The Republic cannot praise you enough,” Bail Organa greets him as the procession begins to traipse into the building. Bail is nice, one of Obi-Wan’s friends, and someone who seems surprisingly genuine. Honestly, Anakin will take what he can get when it comes to political friends and allies.

“Thank you, Senator Organa,” he says. “But I could not have done it without my men.”

Behind them, he can hear Artoo retelling their story for Threepio.

“Of course,” Organa agrees with a smile. “Captain, the bravery and accomplishments of you and your men will not go unrecognised.”

“It is my duty, Senator,” Rex replies, bowing his head deeply.

“I’m afraid the fighting will continue until General Grievous is spare parts,” Anakin continues.

Organa sighs, and Anakin catches sight of a small figure in the shadow of a nearby column. “I will do all I can in the senate,” he says, but Anakin is no longer listening.

“Please, Senator, will you excuse us?” he asks.

“Of course,” Organa agrees, and bows to him.

Anakin bows back and waits, just barely, until he turns away to run ecstatically towards his wife. Her arms open wide to him and still her beautiful grin is wider, and he picks her up around her waist and spins her around until he’s dizzy. Her hair smells of jasmine and is as silky soft as he remembers, and he is loath to pull away even to let Rex in to greet her. She giggles and kisses him softly before pushing on his chest and reaching to Rex, embracing him just as surely despite the armour between them.

“Oh, my boys,” she sighs. Her fingers hook beneath Rex’s helmet and remove it gently, as she always does, to reveal his softly smiling expression beneath. “I’ve missed you so much.”

“As we’ve missed you,” Rex agrees, leaning into Anakin’s touch when he slides his arms around both his should-be-husband and wife and pulls them into his chest.

“There were rumours,” Padmé whispers, “rumours that you’d been killed.”

“I’m right here,” Anakin assures her. “We’re right here, and we’re fine. Though it feels like we’ve been apart for a lifetime.”

“We might have been, too, if they hadn’t called us back from the Outer Rim,” Rex adds.

Anakin snorts. “I distinctly remember you  _ insisting _ you accompany us.”

“And I’m glad I did, having just seen all that.”

“Ahsoka,” Padmé says. “Is she all right?”

“I sure hope so,” Anakin says, pulling his lower lip between his teeth. “We haven’t heard any news, good or bad.”

“Let’s hope for the best, then,” she whispers.

Anakin holds them for a moment, basking in their closeness and warmth. 

“Are you all right?” he asks, hesitant, frowning down at Padmé. “You’re trembling.”

She looks up at him with wide eyes, clearly preparing to tell him something difficult.

“Has something happened?” Rex presses hesitantly.

“Something wonderful,” she sighs. “Ani, Rex… I’m pregnant.”

Anakin feels Rex take a sharp breath. He himself feels like his heart has stopped, right where it is, and that all he can do is stare at her in shock. She stares back, looking between them with growing worry.

“Force,” he breathes. “Padmé, thats—that’s—” He can’t even put it into words. He doesn’t think he’d ever be able to, not the overflowing joy he currently feels threatening to overwhelm and drown him in its depths. “That’s  _ wonderful,” _ he settles for. “That’s— _ stars, _ Padmé.”

“A shiny,” Rex says a little blankly. “You’re growing a  _ shiny.” _

Padmé laughs at that, though it’s still a little tremulous. “Yes, I suppose I am… But Anakin, what are we going to do?”

“I…” Truthfully, Anakin’s mind is stuck back about a minute ago, on the word  _ pregnant. _ He has no kriffing clue what they’re going to do, but he knows already that he will fight to the  _ death _ to protect his family. His family that’s about to be another member strong. 

“We’re not going to worry about anything right now, all right?” he tells her, knowing that his grin has grown wild and probably bordering on concerning. “This is a happy moment, for all three of us. The happiest of my  _ life.” _

She smiles up at him and Rex, Rex who looks as star-struck as he feels. He kisses her, then him, and then hugs them so tightly to his chest he thinks he might crack a rib. He doesn’t even care. 

He’s going to have a  _ child. _

* * *

Anakin wakes from his nightmare on a choked sob. His first thought is  _ oh no, _ his second  _ it’s happening again. _

That makes him pause. Pain, suffering.  _ Again. _

His mother. 

_ Padmé. _

He can’t stay in bed.

He looks over just long enough to make sure she’s breathing and calm, not writhing or screaming like he’d seen moments before. The nights aren’t so cold here, no matter how high up the tower they are, but he pulls on one of his tunics anyway.

Padmé finds him minutes later, staring unseeingly out over the Coruscanti night. He feels empty, bereft, when the hole left by the missing third is so glaring. He still hasn’t got his breathing under control.

She’s showing quite obviously, now that he thinks about it, under her thin satin nightgown (and how amongst the stars did he miss it before?). The rise of her abdomen is beautiful, a gift, and it makes his tumultuous thoughts all the more insufferable.

“Do you think Obi-Wan might be able to help us?” she asks when he finally explains. They’re in one of the worst situations they could be in to birth a child—a Jedi, a senator and a clone—and the thought of Obi-Wan finding out both terrifies him and brings him peace.

Oh, he isn’t stupid enough to think that Obi-Wan doesn’t know about him and Padmé, in the very least. He can’t expect him to have worked out all the angles of their relationship of course, it’s neither common among humans or easy for others to understand (apparently), but he knows Obi-Wan. He’s  _ Obi-Wan. _ No matter how much he makes Anakin want to kick him, he’s always his kind, understanding, loving Master Obi-Wan. 

(And Anakin isn’t blind himself. He knows Obi-Wan better than almost anyone else in the galaxy, he’d wager. He can see the things Obi-Wan may be pretending aren’t there.)

“We don’t need his help,” he decides, but tacks on an unspoken ‘yet’. They’re most likely going to have to tell him at some point. But they’ll do it on their own terms, it’s only right.

He takes Padmé into his arms and his chest feels a little less empty for it. He thinks of Rex in his barracks, alone. Ahsoka out at Mandalore, unaccounted for. So many friends, some family, spread across the galaxy at the heart of the war. He doesn’t know if he has the strength to worry for them all.

* * *

Master Yoda’s advice holds up to be useless in the face of Anakin’s past, present  _ and _ future. Less than useless, actually, if it amounts to ‘letting go’ of the people he’s fought too hard and too long to ever lose preventably.

“All of this is unusual,” Obi-Wan tells him gravely, and when Anakin stops for just a moment, he finds he understands exactly why. “And it’s making me feel uneasy.”

“They  _ need _ you,” Chancellor Palpatine claims. The nausea he’d felt rolling off Obi-Wan comes back to haunt him, twice the strength of before. He glances over his shoulder at Commander Stone, standing vigil, and tries tries  _ tries _ not to think of Ahsoka.

“You are on this Council, but we do not grant you the rank of Master,” Master Windu says. Anakin’s knee-jerk reaction is to bristle, to look to his Master, to complain—but he sees Obi-Wan’s pain, his confusion and feels his anxiety higher than usual. 

Something… isn’t right.

Master Yoda is sent to Kashyyyk, and Rex is waiting for them outside the Council Chamber. It is not unusual to see troops walking around the Temple, it hasn’t been for years now, but Rex had never usually been on-planet long enough to warrant a visit. Since his dreams, though, Anakin has insisted on keeping him as close as possible. He has a feeling Rex feels similarly, albeit for Anakin’s safety rather than his own.

“If I may, sir,” he says when Anakin’s finished his explanation, eyes flicking anxiously to Obi-Wan.

Anakin waves for him to continue before folding his hands into his sleeves. “Of course.”

“You said… You said that he’s looked after you ever since you arrived.” He looks to Obi-Wan again, who nods. Anakin frowns. “Is that not a little, well… Suspicious?”

“No,” Anakin says immediately. “I don’t see why it should be.”

Rex wets his lips and runs his fingers over the rim of his helmet. “Say it was the Commander, then. Citizen Tano. If some old man with a lot of political power, whom you didn’t know very well, decided he wanted to meet her as a youngling fairly regularly. Is that not odd, to you?”

Anakin stares at him, barely comprehending.

“Anakin, he had unmonitored access to you, a child, on agreement with the Council,” Obi-Wan adds in a strained voice. “You ask me why I neither like nor trust him… This is something I have had to hold my tongue on for many years. At least, I did after the last time they threatened to take you away from me.” 

Anakin almost chokes on his next breath. “No—” Obi-Wan grimaces. Rex stares at the floor. “No, no, you can’t be suggesting—”

“Anakin, this is what it looks like to us, outsiders,” Obi-Wan says. “I am sorry, I know you trust him—”

“—But no matter what, I can’t disagree that it’s dodgy,” Anakin finishes dimly. “Force,  _ Obi-Wan—” _

Obi-Wan reaches for him, draws him into a gentle embrace. “Shh, Anakin, we are here. We are here for you. You’re safe with us, I promise.”

“Obi-Wan,” he says. Croaks. “I don’t know what to  _ do.” _

“I know that now is not a good time, but I must tell you that the Council has many suspicions. They gave you this role in expectation that you also report to us any of the Chancellor’s movements—you tell him ours, you tell us his. It’s a shambles, frankly, and it is twisted, but we are at war. Things haven’t been adding up for a long time now, and we need you more than ever. It pains me to tell you like this, or for it to happen in such a way, but our lives have not been fair in a long, long time.”

Anakin nods against his shoulder. Gods, he doesn’t care at this point. If Obi-Wan is hugging after so damn long, things must be worse than he realises. Why he ever doubted Obi-Wan he doesn’t know—Obi-Wan is his Master, his brother, the man who knows him better than anyone else in the galaxy. Even—even Padmé. Even Rex. If Obi-Wan has suspicions, he’d be a karked fool not to listen. So he’s going to. He’s going to start listening and listen well, because at this point he feels like he’s being attacked on all sides and the only confirmed allies he knows are right here holding him and waiting for him at home with their unborn child in the little apartment near the top of the Senatorial Towers. 

Three allies. Three. Four, if he counts Obi-Wan’s Cody. 

And he’s going to damn well make sure he listens to them.

_ * * * _

“The Jedi Council want control of the Republic.”

Immediately, the alarm bells set in motion by Rex and Obi-Wan begin to ring.

“Search your feelings,” is next, and Anakin knows he could have picked that off any Jedi— _ any _ —but the bells just ring louder.

“My trust in them has been shaken,” he admits cautiously, and somehow… Somehow, the Chancellor already knows why.

“All who gain power are afraid to lose it.”

Yes, he can see that.

“Good is a point of view.”

Also true, it’s one of Obi-Wan and Padmé’s favourite debates. This one, though, just doesn’t sit well.

“The Sith and the Jedi are similar in almost every way.”

“You are suggesting we are one and the same?” Anakin blurts.

“You are not?” Palpatine asks calmly. Almost disinterested.

“The Jedi are selfless, and only care about others,” he argues. “The Sith caused suffering as a means to an end.”

“Has it not been said, my boy, numerous times throughout this war, that the Jedi are supposed to be peacekeepers? It has, hasn’t it? And yet why are you fighting this war? The title of General… It should not suit.”

Anakin stands from his seat and looks down at the old, wisened Chancellor well past his prime. “We stepped into the positions demanded of us because we saw it the quickest way to end the suffering brought by this war. It may not have been right and it may not have been wise, but we consider it our duty to the people of the Republic to bring peace and justice to the galaxy.”

There is silence between them for a long moment, broken only by the ballet orchestra below and the gentle applause. At the Chancellor’s pointed look, Anakin awkwardly resumes his seat.

“Anakin, my boy, did you ever hear the tragedy of Darth Plagueis the Wise?”

* * *

They’re walking towards the gangway of the Obi-Wan’s star destroyer, and all Anakin can think is  _ I should be going with you. _ For once, it seems, Anakin recognises that this is not a selfish thought. The point behind his navel where the Force seems to like settling is practically squirming with dreadful anticipation, filling him with nausea that’s only getting worse the closer Obi-Wan gets to leaving.

Something is happening, and Anakin knows it is. It’s just about waiting for  _ when. _

“You’re gonna need me on this one, Master,” he says, unable to keep it to himself any longer.

“Oh, I agree,” Obi-Wan replies immediately. “However it may turn out to be a wild bantha chase.”

They stop there, at the top of the gangway, and Rex settles into parade rest beside them. Anakin studies his old Master’s face a moment before taking a deep breath and jumping headlong into what he feels needs to be said.

“I’ve disappointed you,” he begins, ashamed. “I, uh, haven’t been very appreciative of your training. I’ve been arrogant, and I apologise. I’ve been… troubled, lately, and the Council have been of little help.”

Obi-Wan smiles. “You are strong and wise, Anakin,” he tells him, but Anakin feels neither of those right now. Obi-Wan steps forward to run a comforting hand down his shoulder. “I am very proud of you. I have trained you to the best of my abilities and taught you everything I know, and you have become a far greater Jedi than I could ever hope to be.”

Anakin raises a brow. If not for the choking guilt of all the lies weighting his shoulders, he’d absolutely be arguing the point.  _ Obi-Wan, _ after all, seems to be synonymous with  _ perfect Jedi. _

“Be patient, Anakin,” he continues. “It will not be long before the Council make you a master.”

Anakin sighs gently. “That is not what I’m worried about, Master, but I thank you.”

Obi-Wan frowns at him and bows his head closer, voice lowering. “There’s something else?”

“Master, we don’t have the time. Cody is waiting for you, I’m sure.”

“Anakin…”

“I’ll tell you when you get back,” Anakin compromises, aims for lighthearted even if he doesn’t feel it. “Which means you  _ do _ have to come back now, you realise?”

“Always, Anakin,” Obi-Wan chuckles. He turns to Rex and inclines his head. “Captain, you have my best wishes. I am grateful that you are here to look after him.”

“Of course, sir,” Rex agrees, returning his nod.

Obi-Wan smiles again and turns down the gangway, his robe swaying around his legs as ethereally as he always manages to make it.

“Obi-Wan,” Anakin calls after him before he can think on it. Obi-Wan pauses and turns to him. “May the Force be with you.”

“Goodbye, old friend,” Obi-Wan replies lightly, and Anakin feels something in his stomach drop dead. “May the Force be with you.”

Rex salutes sharply. “May the Force be with you, sir.”

“And you, Captain.”

Rex stands beside Anakin as they watch Obi-Wan disappear into the ship. As discreetly as he can manage, Anakin reaches out with a few fingers to catch hold of Rex’s elbow. His breathing comes easier, but the roiling knot of anxiety doesn’t calm in the least.

“Sir?”

“It’s nothing, Rex, don’t worry.”

They stand there until the destroyer has entered the upper atmosphere, rising above the clouds like a blackened arrowhead.

_ He’ll be fine, _ Anakin thinks to himself. He has Cody with him. 

Cody never lets them down.

* * *

“Save your energy,” says the voice that sounds exactly like Obi-Wan.

“I can’t,” his angel protests weakly, drawing feeble breaths on the medtable.

“Ma’am!  _ Ma’am!” _

_ Rex? _

“Don’t give up, Padmé!”

And then… nothing.

Anakin jerks awake from his meditation with an unpleasant sense of vertigo. He sets aside the console in his hands; he can’t remember why he’d picked it up in the first place. Padmé walks in from the entrance hall with one of her many coats folded neatly over her arm, smiling at him.

“Obi-Wan’s been here, hasn’t he?” he asks, leaning back into the hand she runs over his shoulders as she walks behind the sofa.

“He came by this morning,” she says. Yes, Anakin can feel his presence wrapped around exactly where he’s sitting now. It’s comforting.

“Did he want something?”

“He’s worried about you,” she calls from the bedroom. “He says you’ve been under a lot of stress.”

Rex appears to take the coat from her and lie it beside the compression case they’re packing. “They’ve both been under a lot of stress, lately,” he tells her, the snitch. “Things have been… hectic. Confusing.”

Anakin sighs and forces himself onto aching feet, wandering over to lean against the doorway.

“I feel lost,” he admits. Padmé straightens immediately, gracefully, and stares him down with concern.

“Lost?” she asks. “What do you mean?”

With another deep breath, it all comes tumbling out. “I don’t know who to trust anymore,” he says. “The Council wants me to spy on the Chancellor, and I don’t know whether it’s right or wrong because we’re at war, yes, but it’s  _ treason, _ it’s against the Code! I can’t even tell up from down anymore, Padmé. The things the Chancellor said, about me, about the Jedi… Obi-Wan… Obi-Wan thinks he’s been  _ using _ me. He said—he said—”

Small hands lay a gentle pressure on his chest. He opens his eyes (when had he closed them?) and looks down at his worried wife, her brows curving up so high he thinks it must be hurting her.

“Tell me, Anakin,” she murmurs. “It’s okay.”

“Obi-Wan thinks he’s been—he’s  _ done _ something to me. Since he first met me, probably. I can’t even—I can’t—” A larger, steadying hand slides softly over his collar, and he takes another breath. “All my life, Chancellor Palpatine’s been nothing but nice to me. He’s always listened, always offered his advice. I don’t want to believe it, I don’t, but when you said it, Rex, what if it had been Ahsoka? I’d have been worried out of my mind. I’d never have let her go like that. Obi-Wan said they told him they’d take me away from him if he didn’t. And the things the Chancellor has been saying… Padmé, I don’t want to believe it, but the things he knows…”

“It’s a lot, isn’t it?” she offers, still stroking his chest and back slowly. Rex steps in further to let Anakin rest half on him. “This is a lot to deal with, and it’s hurting you, isn’t it?”

Anakin nods, not trusting himself to be able to do anything other than sob if he opens his mouth.

“We’re going to make sense of all of this, okay?” she promises. “We’ll do it together.”

“Padmé,” he croaks. “Padmé, what if I’ve found a way to save you?”

Immediately, she stills. “What?”

“Anakin—” Rex begins.

“What if I can make it so those nightmares never happen?”

“The dreams? Ani, I—”

“The Chancellor, he told me a story. About a man who could create life or stop people from dying with the Force.” He closes his eyes again and lifts his hands to gather her to his chest. “What if that’s what I need to save you?”

“No.”

Anakin looks down at her. She looks back, a steely set in her eyes and her mouth. “Padmé, what—?”

“Anakin, you just told me you don’t know who to trust,” she reasons. “You told me the Chancellor might have been doing terrible things, influencing your mind or worse for  _ years. _ You told me once that he has an interest in Force things, right? But that a lot of them are Dark? Sith?” Anakin nods. “Saving people from death, Ani… It sounds like something you told me the Sith would do.”

“I can’t lose you!” he exclaims. He leans forward, out of Rex’s hold, and lays his hands on either side of her face. “Padmé, I can’t lose you, or our child.” He glances over his shoulder, but Rex is looking as uncertain and worried as she is. “I  _ can’t!” _

“Anakin, listen to me,” Padmé says. “Whatever happens, we’re going to face it together, all right? I don’t want you thinking about things that shouldn’t be, Ani. You need to stay away from the—the dark side. We’ve seen what it can do, yes? I won’t let you destroy yourself like that.”

Anakin’s breathing is faltering again. So much, too much, he can’t think. He lowers his forehead to Padmé’s and rests there. “Okay,” he says, and believes it.

“Have you ever thought, Ani, that these dreams are a manifestation of your worst fears?” she whispers. “That maybe you’ll drive yourself mad trying to prevent them, and that they’ll end up happening because of it?”

Maybe. It makes sense. It doesn’t, but it does. Maybe she’s right. She’s almost always right.

“Whatever happens, we won’t be alone,” Rex says, embracing Anakin’s back and reaching around to hold Padmé too. He’s also always right. How did Anakin even get here?

“Okay,” he says again. As long as they’re here, where he can hold and be held, they’re all right.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posting... a day early... because I have no patience...  
> And now, the moment we've all been waiting for...  
> Enjoy! :)

On the other side of the holotable, Commander Cody’s shivering blue form fizzles into existence.

“Master Windu, may I interrupt?” he asks. He looks grave; beside Anakin, Master Windu nods. “General Kenobi has made contact with General Grievous, and we have begun our attack.”

Anakin’s heart leaps to his throat. He looks down to Cody’s utility belt instinctually, but knows the Commander would be smart enough to keep Obi-Wan’s lightsaber out of view of the Council if he had it. Sith hells, he hopes Obi-Wan’s all right.

“Thank you, Commander,” Mace acknowledges. Cody nods once and disappears. “Anakin, deliver this report to the Chancellor.”

Anakin looks up at Mace to find him watching intently back.

“His reaction will give us a clue to his intentions.”

“Yes, Master,” Anakin replies, and turns immediately from the table. He is grateful to have laid eyes on Aayla and Cody, even if only for a few moments.

“I sense a plot to destroy the Jedi,” carries Mace’s voice, just well enough to hear. 

Anakin shudders. Somewhere, deep in the Force, he does too.

* * *

“Chancellor,” he greets. The red display panel that Anakin can see hovering over the desk blinks out, and the Chancellor turns in his chair to meet him, expectant. “We’ve just received a report from Commander Cody and Master Kenobi. He has engaged General Grievous.”

“Then we can only hope that Master Kenobi is up to the challenge,” the Chancellor responds immediately.

Anakin looks to the ground and tries to push away the uneasy feeling that refuses to leave him alone, pacing back and forth in the small office space. “I should be out there with him.”

The Chancellor sighs. “It is upsetting to me that the Council doesn’t seem to fully appreciate your talents.” Anakin swallows, feeling his shoulders and thighs begin to tense as if preparing to run. “Don’t you wonder why they won’t make you a Jedi Master?”

“Maybe I am too young, too inexperienced,” Anakin suggests. He runs his teeth over his lower lip and latches onto a thread of suspicion. “I wish I knew. More and more I get the feeling that I am being excluded from the Council.”

He stops and looks up at the Chancellor, who gazes upon him with barely-disguised approval. He takes another breath.

“I know there are things about the Force that they’re not telling me.”

“They don’t trust you, Anakin,” Palpatine tells him, simply as that. As if it is rote truth. Yet Obi-Wan is on that Council, and Anakin feels his faith and trust through their bond whenever they are together.

Palpatine rises from his chair and reaches out to guide Anakin by the shoulder into his chambers. “They see your future. They know your power will be too strong to control. You must break through the fog of lies the Jedi have created around you, for your own good… Let me help you to know the subtleties of the Force.”

Anakin feels his heart begin to beat out of his chest. “How do you know the ways of the Force?” he asks.

“My mentor taught me all there is to know about the Force—even the nature of the dark side.”

Anakin steps out in front of him to face him head on. “You know the dark side?”

The Chancellor purses his lips. “Anakin, if one is to understand the great mystery, you must study all of its facets and intricacies, not just the dogmatic and narrow view of the Jedi. If you wish to become a complete and wise leader, you must embrace… a  _ larger _ view of the Force.” That, Anakin understands. The problem is that he knows the Dark, has touched it, and it has been fighting to consume him ever since. Padmé has forbidden him from it for very good reason. 

They begin to circle each other in this dim, red corridor, Anakin wary of the Chancellor’s borderline smug expression as he paces.

“Be careful of the Jedi, Anakin,” he says. Why? “Only through  _ me _ can you achieve a power greater than any of them. Learn to know the dark side of the Force, and you will be able to save your wife… from certain death.”

The Chancellor smiles, and once again, Anakin feels his heart stop dead.

“What did you say?” he asks quietly. The Chancellor ignores him.

“Use my knowledge, I beg you.”

“No, what did you say about—about Padmé?”

“You sense her end is nigh, do you not? Haven’t you seen it?”

Anakin’s lightsaber is in his hand before he can think about it, ignited and held to the Chancellor’s throat. His anger simmers beneath his very skin when he spits out,  _ “You’re _ the Sith Lord.”

“I know what’s been troubling you,” Palpatine says, and they begin to circle each other again. “Listen to me; don’t continue to be a pawn of the Jedi Council! Ever since I’ve known you you’ve been searching for a life greater than that of an ordinary Jedi—a life of  _ significance. _ Of  _ conscience.” _

Once, this may have been true. He thinks of Ahsoka and Obi-Wan, fighting by his side. Of Rex and Cody and all their men at their backs, covering them, dying for them. He thinks of Padmé’s apartment and the love they share there. 

Once, as a child, he may have wanted to be extraordinary.

“Are you going to kill me?” Palpatine asks when Anakin does not waver in his hold of his glowing saber. He turns away, showing his unarmed, unprotected back.

“I would certainly like to, for all the suffering that you’ve caused!” Anakin snarls.

“I know you would,” Palpatine says. “I can feel your anger. It gives you focus… Makes you stronger.”

Anakin inhales sharply and latches without thinking onto his bond with his Master. From so many parsecs away their connection is fainter, but still reachable, and Obi-Wan’s steady presence is enough to truly focus him. To ground him and bring him back to his senses.  _ This _ is what gives him strength.

Anakin extinguishes his saber. “I’m going to turn you over to the Jedi Council.”

“Of course, you should,” Palpatine encourages. “But you’re not sure of their intentions, are you?”

At this point, honestly, Anakin doesn’t care. Obi-Wan was right. Palpatine is… Oh gods. Oh,  _ Force. _

It’s him. Palpatine is after  _ him. _

“I—I will discover the truth of all of this,” he stutters out.

“You have great wisdom, Anakin,” Palpatine calls after him as he turns hurriedly to leave. “Know the power of the dark side, and you will save Padmé!”

* * *

“Master Windu, I must talk to you!” Anakin calls, jogging to meet him in the middle of the Temple hangar. Mace turns to glare at him, but Anakin doesn’t care. His discovery is more important than any no-running mandate. The smell of engine oil and smoke is less of a comfort to him today than it usually is.

“Skywalker,” he greets. “We’ve just received word that Obi-Wan has destroyed General Grievous.” One of the large knots of worry uncoils in Anakin’s chest. “We’re on our way to make sure the Chancellor returns emergency power back to the Senate—especially before Dooku’s trial.”

Anakin shakes his head. “He won’t give up his power, I’ve just learned a terrible truth.” They stop in a small pool of light between the LAATs. “I have reason to believe Chancellor Palpatine to be the Sith Lord we’ve been looking for.”

“A Sith  _ Lord?” _ Mace clarifies, stepping closer and looking greatly alarmed.

“Yes,” Anakin says. “He claims to know of the dark side of the Force. That he’s been trained in it.”

“Are you sure?” Mace asks softly.

Anakin swallows and meets his gaze surely. “Absolutely.”

“Then our worst fears have been realised. We must move quickly if the Jedi Order is to survive.” Mace motions to him, and they continue their walk down the hangar, this time with a lot more urgency.

“Master, the Chancellor is very powerful. You will need my help if you want to arrest him.”

“For your own good, stay out of this affair,” Mace warns. “I sense a great deal of confusion in you, young Skywalker. There is much fear that clouds your judgement.”

“Master, I feel I  _ must _ go—”

“No.” They come to a stop beside the infantry ship waiting for them. “If what you’ve told me is true, you will have gained my trust. But for now, remain here. Wait in the Council Chambers until we return—have your Captain accompany you if you must.”

Mace turns and boards the gunship. Its engines whine and bay doors shudder as it lifts from the hangar into the Coruscant skylanes. 

“Yes, Master,” Anakin responds sullenly. His heart beats heavier than before he’d left the Chancellor’s chambers.

* * *

The view of the sunset from the Council Chambers is a moving sight. The entire top level of Coruscant is bathed in a sodium-gold glow, a peaceful balm to a heart filled with nothing but worries and anxieties. The Temple is set far enough from the denser populace, from the quarters choked with skyscrapers and material greed, to see for hundreds upon hundreds of klicks all around. Speeders glint in the last throes of the dying light and are silhouetted in copper against the blushing clouds. The chambers themselves are a burning russet and yellowed ivory, disturbed only by the restlessness of the two occupants within.

“It’s not right, Rex,” Anakin murmurs. “Something isn’t right.”

“Nothing is right,” Rex agrees glumly. “The Chancellor is a  _ Sith Lord. _ We’ve been fighting for the  _ Sith _ the whole time.”

“This whole war is a farce.” Anakin rises from his seat and stalks past Rex to the window. “It was fabricated. Completely. Before I even got here, his plans were in motion. All the suffering…”

“You couldn’t have known,” Rex says, coming to stand by his shoulder. “I don’t think anyone could. General Kenobi spoke directly to Dooku, Grievous  _ and _ the rest, and even he didn’t know.”

Anakin leans back to wrap an arm around his waist and lean into his side, armour or no. He swallows thickly and rests his temple against Rex’s, turning for a moment to press a kiss to his hairline. He can feel Padmé, just a weak spark of her, where they left her in her apartment across the city.

Anakin jerks to attention. The Force whispers  _ death. _

“Rex,” he says. “We need to go.”

“Where?” Rex asks.

“To help Master Windu.” 

“What? But Anakin—wait!”

But Anakin is already striding from the Council Chambers. He makes sure Rex is behind him, of course, but he has made up his mind.

“General Windu ordered us to wait for his return,” he protests.

“General  _ Windu _ needs our help,” Anakin says. “We need to go. Something is  _ not right.” _

“Anakin…”

Anakin turns to him, meeting his worried frown with a small, sardonic smile. “You telling me you don’t want to put a blaster bolt straight through the brain of that shabuir?”

“I’d love to,” Rex corrects immediately, “more than anything else.”

“Then come with me. We’ll take him in, find Padmé, and get the kriff out of here.”

The repulsorlifts take them down to where the Temple’s starfighters are docked. Rex slides wordlessly into the copilot’s seat of the ship they choose and begins preparations for Anakin, who takes half a moment to check the fuel lines and levels before hopping into the pilot’s.

“We need to com Padmé,” he says, strapping in and closing the cockpit.

“I’ll do it, you focus on getting us there in time.”

Anakin listens to the dial tone ring and ring while he soars between the speeders in the skylanes. Just when he’s sure it’s going to ring out, it connects.

“Captain?” Padmé asks. “How can I help you?”

“Senator, thank you for picking up,” Rex says. “We can’t—we can’t tell you much of what’s going on at the moment, it’s highly sensitive information. Anyone could be listening. I’ve been told to deliver a message to make sure you stay inside and stay safe. Things are getting messy over here.”

“Captain, is there anything I can do?”

“No, sir. Your safety is our highest priority. You’re to leave as soon as you can if anything starts looking bad. We’ll be right behind you.”

“Noted. Com me with any updates you have.”

“Understood, Senator. I’ll be in touch soon.”

Anakin pulls the fighter into a bay on the Chancellor’s level, beside an empty city transport. He leaps out of the cockpit before the engines are finished shutting down, joined by Rex at his side holding his blasters at the ready and waving off the Coruscant Guard they pass—who knows who’s on their side anymore. 

At the door to the Chancellor’s office they’re met by the sound of howling winds, the sight of shattered glass all around and three downed Jedi Masters. Anakin stumbles. 

“You are under arrest,  _ my Lord,” _ declares Master Windu, lunged in the frame of the wild and open Coruscant night behind the Chancellor’s desk.

“Anakin, I told you it would come to this!” croaks the Chancellor’s voice, sickly, at the end of Mace’s vivid fuschia saber. He’s cowering in the crook of the curved window socket amongst the broken transparisteel. “I was right! The Jedi are taking over!”

“The oppression of the Sith with never return,” Mace vows. Anakin removes his own saber from his belt and levels it beside Mace’s.

“I have been led to believe your lies for too long, Chancellor,” he growls. He can see Rex’s pistols aimed and steady out of the corner of his eye.

“You’ve lost,” Mace says, and Palpatine laughs.

“No!” he crows. “No, no,  _ you _ will die!”

In an instant both of his hands are raised and shivering with a blinding blue light that arcs straight towards Mace—kark, more of that blasted Sith lightning. Mace catches it along his saber and Anakin jerks forward, only to be wrenched away by an invisible hand around his waist.

_ “Argh!” _ he grunts, finding himself flung against the wall of the office and the breath knocked from his lungs. There’s a second crash, a clatter and a shout as Rex is thrown back next to him.

“Traitor!” Palpatine screams. Anakin struggles off the floor and recalls his lightsaber to his hand, already running forward to try to intercept again.

_ “You’re _ the traitor!” Mace yells at Palpatine.

Then, before their eyes, a grotesque and mesmerising change seems to take place. Palpatine’s face greys as he shudders with the force of the electricity he summons, sagging and deepening with wrinkles.

“I have the power to save the one you love!” he promises Anakin. “Join me, and we will save her!”

Anakin, despite his conviction, falters.

“You must choose!”

“Full disrespect, sir, but I’m calling gundark shit,” Rex snaps. His blasters train on the Chancellor a second time, only for him to grin and turn one hand on Rex instead.

_ “NO!” _ Anakin shrieks. Rex is lifted by the force of the lightning and flung across the floor again, yelling and writhing with pain where he lands.  _ “NO! REX!” _

Anakin runs to him, crouches by his side and thrusts his saber right into the thick of the attack. The lightning refocuses on him and Rex is left unmoving, shockingly still, and with a tiny wisp of smoke curling up from inside his bucket.

With another shout, Anakin rises from his crouch and begins pushing back against Palpatine. He closes his eyes and focuses on the pulsing signatures of Master Windu, braced on the ledge, and Rex, weak and unconscious but breathing. He winds his thoughts around the thread leading to Obi-Wan, halfway across the galaxy.

When he calls the Force to his side, it answers without hesitation. 

Anakin snaps his saber blade aside, throwing off the lightning like a blaster bolt. He strides towards the Chancellor, who cackles in perceived victory.

“Good, my boy, good!  _ Use _ your anger, let it flow through you!”

Anakin reaches out and takes the second streak of lightning in hand, pulling it away from Mace’s trembling blade. It crackles between his fingers, snapping and hissing, as he compresses it down with the Force to fit in his palm. Palpatine lowers his hands, robbed of his armament, and watches Anakin hold the spitting ball of white light in his hand and crush it in his fist. It disappears instantly, as if it had never been.

“I am tired of the lies of the Sith,” he says. “I will not be controlled by you. I will not have you turn me against my friends, my family, my Order or the Republic.”

“Anakin, my dear boy, I have spoken nothing but the truth,” Palpatine wheezes. “It is the Jedi who are controlling you, using you—lying to you!”

“We have done nothing of the sort,” Mace states firmly. “Nor do we intend to. We  _ will _ restore peace to this galaxy, and make certain that our fallen brothers and sisters did not die in vain.”

“They will never accept you, Anakin. They will cast you out for your crimes, your insolences—”

“Then so be it.” Anakin raises his saber again, holding its end mere inches from Palpatine’s throat. “But I  _ will _ bring balance to the Force.”

“She will die, Anakin,” Palpatine says. “You will not save her.”

Anakin’s jaw clenches, painfully. The sear at the back of his eyes threatens to spill over into hot tears and burn down his face. “You won’t have me, Palpatine.  _ You’ve lost.” _

There is a split second of warning in the Force, enough for Anakin to realise what’s going to happen but unable to react; Palpatine’s expression narrows, clouds, and suddenly he is not nearly as weakened as he was a moment ago. He thrusts out both hands and sends Anakin and Mace flying. Mace shouts as he collides with the other side of the window frame and falls—falls, falls,  _ falls _ from the colossal dome of the Senate building.

_ “NO!” _ Anakin finds himself shouting again, struggling to catch hold of him with the Force and pinned to the floor. He tries to calm himself again, tries to make himself focus and reach into the Force, but he’s attacked on all sides with an onslaught of panic and doubt.

Padmé, she’s going to die, and he knows it as certainty. He could have saved her if he’d just bowed to the Chancellor, if he’d—no. Padmé wouldn’t want that.  _ But Padmé is going to die. _

The Council doesn’t trust him, Obi-Wan doesn’t need him. He’s a hindrance to Rex and all of the vode, a  _ menace. _ He should have left them with Ahsoka.

Darkness creeps in all around, in the Force and into his vision. He kicks and screams, shying away from the shadowed, mocking faces that swim and laugh before him. Distantly he feels pain, pain more acute than any other, even when he lost his arm. Voices whisper into his ear and his mind.

_ He should have bowed to the Sith. _

“You have chosen wrongly, my boy,” Palpatine says. He sounds regretful. Anakin doesn’t care. “You were to be my apprentice, and we were to rule the galaxy together, and bring peace.”

_ “I—won’t—bow to you!” _ he heaves.

“It is a shame. I did not want to have to do this.”

Anakin almost says  _ then don’t, _ but the acute pain suddenly skyrockets to  _ intense pain, _ and—oh, he’s being electrocuted. His whole body feels like it’s on fire. He can feel the floor at his back solid and unforgiving against his jerking body. Something smells like it’s burning, and someone is yelling. By the tearing of his throat, it’s probably him.

When the excruciating searing  _ finally _ abates, Anakin is left breathless and limp on the floor. Slowly he begins to test his body. Left hand—still attached, still functioning. Left leg, right leg, left toes, right toes. He can hear the Chancellor talking to someone, but he can’t make out what they’re saying. Right hand.  _ Right hand. _ Right—kriff. He’s probably lucky the cybernetic nerve feedback didn’t do more damage than it feels like. He’s stuck with unmovable clawed fingers until he can find either an appropriate toolkit or a replacement.

Before he can think to pick his head up off the floor, on an aching neck at that, another figure looms above him. He fights the urge to shy away and looks up at them, blinking until his eyesight returns enough to make out… Clone armour. Coruscant red.

Without warning, his boots are yanked off his feet one after the other. He cries out at the shooting lance of pain down his spine, and again when he’s rolled over onto his front rather unceremoniously and stripped of his outer robe, too. The clunking of plastoid hitting the floor fills the otherwise quiet room. Anakin lifts his head to turn it to the side and spies his lightsaber on the floor, just out of reach of his working arm. He stretches out his twitching fingers slowly towards it, only to freeze when his own boots appear in his line of sight. On someone else’s feet. His cloak falls around the figure’s shins and swirls sickeningly. The figure crouches and collects the lightsaber in one hand, testing its weight and flicking the blade on.

“Catch them, Commander, while they are still unaware,” says Palpatine.

“Yes sir,” replies the figure. A clone. His voice is dead and empty, and the Force flows thick and dark around him. Anakin watches him stride from the room, hood pulled low over his face and saber humming.

Palpatine hums. Anakin resents the satisfaction he hears there, the smug sense of victory that swirls in the Force. He hears him move, the hems of his ridiculous senatorial robes whispering over the floor. He thinks he’s waiting for Anakin to die. He’ll be waiting a long damn time.

Anakin flicks his movable hand towards himself. The Force drags itself closer, coalescing around him, and Palpatine’s unconscious body thuds heavily to the floor behind his ruined desk. The room is still once more, and as soon as Anakin feels his suggestion overpower the Sith, feels it  _ take, _ he throws himself onto his side and levers up onto his knees.

His vision whites and the blood drains from his face for one heart-stopping moment. He closes his eyes, bracing heavily on his malfunctioning arm and once again focuses himself in the Force. _He can do this._ _Rex needs him._ Rex. Rex is a mere few feet away, just where Anakin had left him. The rise and fall of his chest is a small comfort, but a comfort nonetheless.

Anakin crawls over to him on protesting limbs. It’s only a dull ache, nothing he can’t handle, but he must admit his throat is killing him—scraped raw, no doubt. Rex’s helmet comes away easily, thankfully undamaged, and reveals a troubled frown underneath. Oh,  _ Rex, _ Anakin sighs, placing two fingers at each of his temples and nudging gentle tendrils of the Force through him. They glow where his nerves and skin and aching bones are on fire, sinking into them shallowly and teasing away the pain and the damage. Anakin’s never been very good at healing, but for now the Force seems to be granting him an exception.

“Hm?” Rex murmurs as he begins to come around. “Wha’s… wha’s happ’n’d?”

“Something bad,” Anakin tells him quietly. “Something very, very bad.”

“Chanc’llor?”

“Asleep, but not for long.”

“C’n’t we kill ’im?”

Anakin sighs again. “Honestly, I don’t know. We need to get out of here. Find reinforcements. Warn the rest of the Jedi and—”

Fuck, he can already feel Palpatine fighting through the layers of his suggestion. He grits his teeth and hauls Rex up, slinging one deadweight arm over his shoulders and steadying him with his frozen hand.

“Come on, work with me, we’ve got to get out of here.”

Rex’s head lolls on Anakin’s shoulder and he hisses a sharp breath into his ear. “Wh’t happ’n’d to your shoes?”

“Someone took them,” Anakin tells him, suppressing the insane urge to laugh. “Come on now, let me pick up your bucket and we’ll go… We’ll go to the barracks. They’re closer.”

They stumble as quickly as they can from the Chancellor’s quarters. Anakin tries as best he can not to let the rising wave of unease swallow him as he notices a distinct lack of Guard in the building. Surely, that can’t be good.

Blessedly, their ship is right where they landed it. Anakin helps Rex clamber back into the co-pilot’s and thanks the Force that he’s becoming more and more aware with each passing moment. He drops into the pilot’s seat and preps for liftoff faster than he may ever have done before in his life. 

It’s a good thing their barracks are closer to here than the Temple. He’s fairly certain his com was in his robe pocket.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can y'all tell I've never been hit by lightning or no?


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is not how the Force works. I know, in my heart of hearts, that I am taking great liberties.  
> But I can dream :(  
> Oh, the drama of it all

“Something’s happening.” 

Rex’s murmur is modulated through his bucket, but his sudden spike of fear is unmissable. When he stills against Anakin’s shoulder as they’re limping towards the 501st barracks, his hands, hovering, begin to tremble visibly.

“What do you mean?” Anakin asks. It’s late evening, dark as anything, and his socked feet are freezing and uncomfortable on the duracrete walkway.

“Something bad,” Rex says. 

Right, as if none of the rest of this is _bad._

But then he’s grabbing Anakin by the arm and wrenching him down the dark alley between the prefabs. Anakin squeaks in surprise (no, not squeaks, he’s better than that) and goes down hard on his knees, hunched in the shadows with Rex and absolutely thrown for a loop.

“Rex,” he hisses. _“Rex,_ what’s going on?”

“I don’t—I don’t know—” Rex chokes. He looks drawn, shaken, and is jumping at every distant thud of troopers’ boots. He scrambles backwards suddenly, into the wide space between the two barrack walls. His blasters are in hand and rising shakily to take aim at… at _Anakin._

“Rex?”

There’s a shout somewhere inside the barracks around them. Several dozen sets of footsteps clatter out into the night, echoing with the sound of rifles unholstering and priming. Anakin looks from Rex to the empty entrance of the alley and back, eyes wide with his own unstoppable fear and hands raising in a poor attempt to placate.

“Rex, what’s—”

“Sir, I can’t,” Rex stammers. “I can’t hold it back, I—” His hands shudder as he clutches his pistol grips. They level right at Anakin’s chest, and Anakin can’t seem to dredge up a single thought.

 _“Move, move, move!”_ someone frighteningly close to them shouts. 

With absolutely no warning at all, Anakin’s head begins to _pound._ He feels like he’s been bludgeoned in the head by the sorrow of the Force, temporarily deafened by its grieving and, underneath that, its insistence. He follows the weak thread of it, that nudging, blind and deaf to the physical world, and ends up curling around Rex’s mind. Rex’s mind, filled with uncertainty and scared shitless and at utter war with itself. No, it’s his _brain,_ intruded upon by the very object the Force is leading him to like a beacon.

“Sir, I can’t!” Rex cries out. “I can’t… I—I don’t know… how much longer…! Anakin… _Anakin, I can’t!”_

Anakin seizes the small intrusion with his consciousness. It’s so faint, so tiny, such a part of _Rex_ that he can’t tell what the hell it is, only that the Force is fucking adamant that it shouldn’t be there. Anakin swallows, terrified, and pulls.

A single blaster shot fries the air above his right ear and ricochets loudly off the side of the building behind him. Rex crumples to the ground for the third time that night, and Anakin’s whole world goes quiet.

Somewhere, in the very back of his mind, there is shouting. Shouting and running footsteps and a whole platoon of blasters travelling from hand to hand to hand. Anakin ignores it all, his spinning thoughts too fast and somehow perfectly silent as time slows impossibly down. He crawls over the unforgiving duracrete towards the blue-white-black body on the floor, stopping only when he can sit back and draw the limp shoulders into his lap. Rex’s helmet clatters away somewhere. Anakin doesn’t care for where, only the slack face beneath it, the lifelessness of his sprawl, and the, the—

The puff of breath that ghosts hot and wet from between cracked lips over Anakin’s fingers.

 _“Rex,”_ Anakin gasps, near sobs. “Rex, Rex. Force, you’re _alive.”_

“There, get them!” someone shouts from far too nearby, and the coarse callousness of it sends a painful jolt straight down Anakin’s spine.

Gathering Rex close to his chest he twists to face the crowd of troopers spilling into the alley mouth. He snarls at their rising blaster rifles, extending his flexing left hand out to still their exacted, practised movements. He feels his awareness spindle around them, bend and warp around their spines and travel up, up, into their minds. They’re still training their blasters on him, turning, fingers twitching towards triggers. There’s no time, there are too many of them, he’s out of time, there’s no time and they’re going to shoot him, he’s going to die, they’re going to die—

Anakin clenches his fist, and every single one of them screams as they drop, deathly still, to the ground. 

Tears stream freely and hotly down cheeks. The Force is so thick with darkness and death that without its insistent guidance he feels he can no longer trust his own senses. The ambient light of the Temple’s signature is dimmed, murky with suffering and dripping with blood. He can feel… Stars, he can _feel_ his fellow Jedi, his friends, his _family, dying_ all across the galaxy, and he is powerless to stop it. 

The tears continue to roll. Clinging to his cyare, limp in his arms, he cries.

* * *

“General?”

Anakin’s head snaps up. His eyes are still blurry and his cheeks are stiff and sticky; he keeps wiping his nose on his sleeve, but the tears refuse to stop.

“Trooper?” he croaks out.

The clone in front of him staggers as he gets to his feet and gasps, clutching the side of his head. “G-General Skywalker? What happened?”

“I don’t—” Anakin’s voice fails him, falling whispery and weak from his lips. _“Fives.”_

“Sir?”

Anakin stays quiet for another moment, feeling everything begin to click into place. _Too late,_ his own thoughts taunt him. _It’s too late to stop it._

The Senate had tried him, not believed a word he’d said, and had executed him. He can see now that it was on the Chancellor’s orders, of course, but knowing would never have made Fives’ any less of a painful name around the 501st.

But maybe they can still save some of them. His death can’t be in vain. _It can’t._

“What’s your name, trooper?” Anakin asks.

“CT-4738, Cannon, sir,” Cannon answers, snapping to attention. “187th Legion.”

“187th?” Anakin squints into the darkness. The markings around Cannon’s visor and shoulders are an indistinguishable colour to him now, but it’s easy to imagine the vibrant purple they’d show in daylight. “Cannon, where are my men?”

“Commander Appo and the 501st left before we found you here, sir,” Cannon reports. He’s doing an okay job at sounding attentive while he surveys his prone brothers, but Anakin does not begrudge him the distraction. He’s pretty shaken himself.

“Where did they go? Why?”

Cannon stops to tilt his helmet at him. “I thought you took them, sir.”

“I didn’t,” Anakin says. “I was with Master Windu in the Senate, I—we only just arrived.”

“…A Jedi did come to collect them, sir.”

Anakin hesitates. “Actually, trooper, I’m not sure they did. Whoever it was, it wasn’t me.”

“Sir, if I may ask—”

Canon cuts himself off abruptly as one of his nearby brothers groans and lifts a feeble arm. He ducks down to them, helping them sit up.

“W-Where… where are w-we?” the trooper asks, stuttering. 

“Outside the bunks, vod, with General Skywalker,” Cannon tells him. Anakin adjusts Rex’s sprawl in his lap as he watches. Several bewildered moments pass as the trooper tries and fails to move about.

“Why were we—why were—” the trooper raises one hand again and drops it heavily to the ground. “Orders. Why?”

“Horns?”

“C—umm, Ca-Cannon?”

Cannon crouches lower to the ground and rests his palm flat on Horns’ chestplate. “Yes vod, it’s me.”

“Why?”

“Oh no,” Anakin whispers to himself. He looks from trooper to trooper, laid out unceremoniously amongst scattered blaster rifles. “What have I done?” he asks. Two Force signatures are missing. Gone. _Gone._ “What have I _done?”_

“What you had to.” 

The rough-textured brush of a gloved hand over his cheek brings Anakin right back to the man in his lap, awake and gazing up at him with beautiful, sorrowed brown eyes. Anakin lets go of a shaky breath and covers Rex’s hand with his, letting the back of his throat and eyes burn without shame. The tears begin to fall again as he leans down to press their foreheads together. As he _aches_ to feel the reality of Rex’s life force against his, just for a moment. He wants to never, ever let go of him again, and by the death grip Rex has on him he’d wager he’s not alone. Together they breathe, and Anakin shakes apart quietly in his arms.

“Sander?” they hear Cannon call out to another waking trooper. The man in question seems startled by the address, looking over and staring at his brother for a long moment. 

“Cannon?” he says eventually.

“Sander, are you all right?”

“Hey, where are we? Where are Law and General Utila?”

Anakin squeezes his eyes closed tightly, hating himself more and more for his recklessness by the second.

“General—Sander, what are you talking about?”

“Why are we… This is Coruscant. How did we get to _Coruscant?”_

“I’ve done something bad, Rex,” Anakin sobs, his voice a whisper. “This isn’t right.”

“No,” Rex says, pausing to cough dryly. “The only thing right about this whole mess was Fives. He was right about the chips. We would have—we—you would have _died._ But you saved us, didn’t you? We’re here.”

Anakin tries to breathe but every drag comes in sparingly, rasping against his lungs and shredded throat. “I don’t know, I don’t know! I’ve hurt them, Rex, I could have killed you all. I didn’t know what I was doing, I could have _killed_ you.”

“But if you hadn’t, we would have killed _you,”_ Rex argues. His voice is hoarse, barely above a whisper himself, as if saying the words is what makes it real. And it does, in a way. Everything is too real all at once, crushing down on their shoulders and squeezing their insides with panic.

“Skywalker,” says a low, familiar, and downright impossible voice. “I take it I am to thank you for saving my men?”

Anakin jerks upright again. Before him is Master Windu, inexplicably _alive_ and appearing unscathed as he checks on the troopers around him. Consumed as he is with everything else—the pain, the grief, the overwhelming confusion and panic—Anakin still feels a cold bolt of fear strike through his heart at being caught in such a compromising manner. 

“Master Windu,” he squeaks, voice higher than on helium and twice as cracked. “How are you… How are you _here?”_

Mace chuckles dryly as he straightens, taking in Anakin’s tear-streaked and rumpled state. “Have you forgotten that we are Jedi, able to commune with the Force to guide and protect ourselves?”

And apparently he had, because a pathetic “Oh,” is all Anakin can think to say to that. He pulls Rex closer to his chest again, helping him sit up so he’s no longer lying awkwardly across Anakin’s legs. “I’m sorry, Master. I didn’t know what to do. The Force was guiding me, but there were so many of them at once.”

“I do not blame you, Skywalker,” Mace says. “Though I would ask you where your lightsaber is. And, for some reason, your shoes.”

Anakin ducks his head, for the first time feeling ashamed of his new vulnerabilities. “I don’t know, Master. Palpatine was trying to kill us. I think it was a Commander who took them, but I don’t know what for. Do you know what’s happening, Master?”

“Our troops have turned.” The finality in Mace’s voice is a cold knife to the gut, serrated and twisting. “Palpatine is using them to destroy the Jedi and take ultimate power in the Senate; they are marching on the Temple as we speak.”

Anakin feels himself choke as he sits up straighter, straining to see over the barrack rooves to the distant spires of the Temple. From his ungainly slump on the floor, the most he can see is a thick plume of rising smoke against the bright headlights of the speeders in the night sky.

“No,” he murmurs. “No, we have to go help them. We have to—Master, are there any ships left on the—”

“Skywalker, I’m not sure you’re in any state to fight at the moment,” Mace interrupts. Anakin bristles and then withers, almost instantly, when another stab of pain runs through the base of his skull. “Besides, what can two Jedi do against ten thousand men? My own will be slaughtered if they’re seen, _we_ will be slaughtered if we’re seen. Coruscant is no place for the Jedi any longer, Anakin.”

“We should have listened to Fox,” Rex mutters unexpectedly. Anakin looks back down at him and he closes his eyes tightly, a persistent tear track glistening on his cheek in the faint light. “He knew something was up, he told us. He hated Palpatine. Called him a—a _damn suspicious shabuir_ every time we went out together.”

The clones have turned. The chips are real. Everywhere, all across the galaxy the Jedi are being gunned down by their own friends and family. _Family._

“Obi-Wan!” Anakin cries out suddenly. “Ahsoka, oh Force, I don’t know if they’re—oh, kriffing _hells…”_ He scrambles for his pockets to check for his com, but comes up with nothing. It _was_ in his cloak. _Fuck._

Anakin reaches desperately into the Force for them. His bond with Ahsoka is gone, of course, some days a searing void and others a smarting wound. Obi-Wan is there, though, as solid is ever, and it alleviates at least some of his fears. Temporarily. 

“Sir,” Rex says. He holds out his hand and drops his com into Anakin’s palm. “I don’t know if it’ll get a signal, it got pretty beat up when I went down.”

“Thank you,” Anakin breathes, already flicking through to Ahsoka’s frequency. “Thank you.”

“Skywalker, we can’t stay here much longer,” Mace warns.

“Sir,” says one of his men. “We’ll take up perimeter, wave anyone away if they come too close.”

“Good thinking,” Mace replies, and in the same moment Ahsoka’s panic-stricken voice comes waveringly down the channel.

“Rex?” she says. “—ex, we’ve a bi-it of a situation here!”

“Ahsoka!” Anakin cries out in relief. “You’re okay!”

“Not for l——ong, Skyguy! My men are tr—o kill me and I have n-n-n-o idea why!”

“It’s the chips, Ahsoka, the chips! Fives was right, and now they’ve all been turned by the Chancellor—”

“Skyg—y, you’re breaking up!”

“Destroy the chips!” Anakin nearly shouts. “Ahsoka, destroy the chips! Use the Force, it’ll guide you!”

“Ch——ips? What— _AGH!”_

“Ahsoka? _Ahsoka!”_

The line dies with a screech of static, and the galaxy screams _Death._

Anakin scrambles with the com, trying to renew the transmission, but finds his hands shaking violently enough that it’s a struggle just to keep hold of the thing. Rex’s fingers curl over his and squeeze gently, extracting the dying unit and inspecting it with a grim set to his mouth.

“She’ll make it, General,” he says quietly. “If there’s one thing she’s good at, it’s surviving.”

“Yeah,” Anakin agrees. He knows his eyes are open, but he isn’t seeing anything that’s in front of him. “She is.”

“Obi-Wan?” Mace enquires softly. 

Anakin takes a steadying breath, trying to match himself to Rex’s powerful, steadfast rhythm, and checks again on the shining thread between their minds. “Still there,” he confirms. “Still there. Force, Cody…”

“Don’t think about it,” murmurs Rex. “If I could… If _I_ could, I’m sure he could too.”

Anakin swallows again. Nods. 

“Skywalker, we need to move.”

Rex shifts to kneel in front of him. Anakin blinks and suddenly he can see again, see the deep furrows of concern lining Rex’s handsome face and his outstretched palms waiting to help Anakin up. Wiping his face on his shoulder, Anakin takes both of Rex’s hands and climbs slowly—stiffly—to his feet. His legs are deadened and achingly sore, his toes as cold as ice and his hips for some reason creaking up a storm. His cybernetic arm is still clawed and unresponsive, but that doesn’t look like it’ll be changing anytime soon.

“Where do we go?”

“Where do we know that’s safe?” Mace asks. “We could always sneak into the lower levels of the Temple, but we don’t know how far the attack has progressed.”

“What would we do there, Master, other than tell everyone else to stay away?” Anakin asks. “We can’t use the spaceports, so our next best bet at escaping this disaster is our own hangars. Those will surely be under an intense lockdown.”

“I still think it’s worth a shot,” Mace argues. “You’re unarmed, Skywalker, but if my men can sneak me in on one of their transports then I should be able to take a ship without anyone noticing.”

Anakin shakes his head, fights back tears. “Respectfully, Master, but that’s much too dangerous.”

“If I may, General, there will be hundreds and hundreds of men in every part of that Temple,” Rex reasons. “If we can get back to the Senate, find someone there willing to help, we might have a chance at getting off this planet.”

“But _who,_ Captain, would be willing to take such a risk?” Mace sighs and drags a sooty hand down his face, leaving thick black streaks over his forehead and temples. “Who would take us in right under Palpatine’s nose?”

“Senators Amidala and Organa,” Anakin answers immediately. “Organa is Obi-Wan’s friend, he knows us like brothers and is a true believer of our cause. Senator Amidala is—she’s a friend. _Our_ friend. I’m sure you know how she is, Master, she’d never turn us away if she knew the truth.”

“Go to her,” Mace says. “I will find Senator Organa. Amidala is in a precarious state of health and I’m sure she could do with the extra protection. I have a sneaking suspicion that as Chancellor, Palpatine would want her out of the picture as soon as possible.”

Anakin and Rex both tense at the thought. Anakin knows instinctively that he’s right, how many times has Padmé almost died during the course of this stupid war already? 

“Yes, Master,” he says, and bows lowly. “We have a small ship waiting not far from here.”

“Good,” Mace replies. “If things start going south, I want you to get the hell out of here. Palpatine is after you, Skywalker, and I’d rather you not fall into the hands of the Sith. If you can find anyone else out there while you’re at it, I’d be grateful.”

“Yes, Master,” Anakin says again.

Mace hesitates before turning away. “I want you to know, Skywalker, that I am very impressed by what you’ve done today. Your actions have been honourable, and you have very successfully and skillfully commanded the Force above the levels of our teachings without succumbing to the Dark. Obi-Wan will be proud to hear it.”

Anakin can feel the hair-trigger sobs threatening to return. He swallows them down hurriedly and bows again. “Thank you, Master. I owe it to the guidance and trust of the Council.”

“May the Force be with you, Anakin, Captain.”

“May the Force be with you, Master,” Anakin replies. Rex salutes.

“May the Force be with you, General.”


	5. Chapter 5

The lights are off in Padmé’s apartment when the fighter touches down on the landing pad. Anakin signals for Rex to stay behind him as they move forward, silent and wary of every passing craft. A speeder takes off from somewhere, several levels below them. Anakin flinches. He doesn’t dare look down.

They make it through the door, but that’s as far as they get.

“Hands up!” someone shouts, and in an instant a dozen of the Coruscant Guard appear from crouched positions all around them.

“Don’t shoot!” Rex demands immediately. Anakin raises his hands, palms outward. “I have the prisoner.”

Never mind that Anakin knows it’s a ruse, never mind that he felt the chip crush beneath his own power, a powerful frisson of fear shivers down his spine. The Guard seem to have no such qualms.

“Traitor!” yells Commander Stone, and every blaster rises to fire on them. Anakin reaches into the Force and shoves them backwards, dropping to the floor when shots go off in all directions. The room is filled with shouts and smoke and he hauls Rex behind the nearby sideboard, thankful all of a sudden for the fancy furnishings Padmé insisted on all that time ago. They sit with their backs to it and their hands tightly clasped, Anakin desperately trying to centre himself and think up a plan. Instead he thinks about going back in time and smacking the whole ‘unnecessary decadence’ argument right out of his own mouth—a stupid thought, when he’d also like to do a lot of much more important things.

Padmé. They have _Padmé._

“Rex,” he breathes, “if I take out all of their chips I won’t be good for all that much more after. Not if you don’t want to be carrying me out of here.”

Rex squeezes his hand tighter and swallows. The movement of his throat is visible through his blacks and beneath the rim of his helmet.

“Do it,” he says. “I’ll take out anyone else coming after us.”

“Rex, no—”

_“Do it,_ Anakin.”

One blaster shot scores the floor two inches from Anakin’s foot and he wrenches it back with a yelp. Rex fires several bolts blind around the edge of the sideboard. The smell of burning carpet burns his nostrils. “I don’t want you to have to fire on your brothers! I’ll knock them out, or I’ll, I’ll do something else and we can—!”

“Anakin,” Rex growls. “Do it, now!”

Anakin takes a deep, slow breath and releases it, taking each of the soldiers by the shoulders and stilling them. The barrage slows as he winds his thoughts through theirs, tracing their spines and searching their heads one by one. 

Before he can execute the move (and, he fears, the troopers themselves), a shrill whoop of binary glee shatters the tension. Anakin drops the troopers in surprise, twisting out from behind their cover with less than a thought and shock-widened eyes. A blur of blue and white rushes past him, spinning in circles in the middle of the room. In the centre of Artoo’s madness is a sight Anakin almost laughs to see; the twelve troopers, struggling, have been crushed together and bound around the arms with steel wire, a binding that’s only growing stronger with every loop Artoo makes. All of their blasters have been dropped at their feet or trapped between their bodies, so he hurries forward to kick away the ones he can reach. Rex crawls out a moment later and surveys the scene with palpable incredulity.

“Thank the Force for droids, huh?” Anakin says. He thinks he’s maybe bordering on hysteria. He certainly sounds like it. Artoo beeps a very garbled string of insults and reprimands, rolling over to bash against Anakin’s leg. He reaches down and pets his dome fondly, smiling. “Yes, thank you very much for saving our lives again, Artoo. You did very well.”

“Traitors!” one of the troopers shouts again. “How dare you turn your backs on the Republic!”

“Let’s just be grateful they can’t reach their coms,” Rex mutters. He flinched back when one of them tries to lunge at him, sending the whole squad stumbling and crashing to the floor.

“Where’s Padmé?” Anakin demands of them. “The Senator, where is she?”

“And why would we tell _you?”_ Stone menaces.

Anakin crouches beside him and touches light fingers to the side of his head. “Because either way I’m going to knock you out and destroy your inhibitors, so you might as well just get it over with.”

“I’ll never bow to you! You’re just as bad as Separatist scu—”

Stone falls asleep before he finishes his sentence. Anakin ignores the angry protests of his brothers as he searches his skull for the chip and takes it apart, admittedly much more carefully than he’d had time for before. He goes through each of the Guard in turn, crouching by their heads and trying not to twitch at the feel of sweat beading on his forehead and beginning to roll down his back. His arms are weak by the time he’s finished, but all of them are alive and well and sleeping peacefully.

“Anakin,” Rex murmurs, stepping forward to catch him as he collapses, exhausted, onto his arse.

“They’re all fine,” he says. “They’ll wake up soon enough.”

“We might not have that much time, there’s going to be another squad on the way as soon as they miss check-in.”

“I’ll get… I’ll get some boots on and we can go and find Padmé,” he says. “We’ll check the Senate first, it’s the most likely place.”

Rex sighs. “Let’s hope we find her before we die trying.”

Anakin takes a moment to breathe again, to lie back in Rex’s arms and pretend he’s all right, pretend they’re both all right and that the Chancellor isn’t out for their heads on pikes. Or, in the worst case, their minds on the end of a darkside leash.

Two rooms away, the entrance to the apartment slides open. Anakin feels Rex tense behind him as even, booted steps tread steadily towards them. There’s nothing close enough to hide behind in time, but it’s just one person and Rex has his DC-17s at the ready, they can handle this.

At least, Anakin thinks they can until a dark Jedi robe sways into view. Rex falters, obviously hesitant to come across as threatening when all of his brothers have seemingly turned traitor. It doesn’t matter, though, when the figure drops their hood and stares right at them, and he _feels_ Rex’s world come crashing down around them. Those are Anakin’s robes the figure’s wearing, and underneath them is none other than Commander Fox. Rex’s isn't breathing, doesn’t even seem to be able to think properly, because it’s _Fox._ Dead-eyed and barely conscious, but twitching for his rifle all the same.

Anakin reaches out with the screaming Force and snatches Fox around the arms and waist. He hisses and slams back into Rex’s chest at the burn of the malice he can feel swirling around the Commander, cloaked thickly around his mind and threading through every thought and every move. It’s dark, blacker than night and the void of space. Anakin is surprised there’s any of Fox still left behind, but there is. He can feel it. 

The choking clutch of the Chancellor lashes at Anakin, laughing cold and cruel when he begins to slip. Rex raises his pistols again, shaking.

“Don’t,” Anakin manages to murmur. “Palpatine has him, he’s in his _mind.”_

“What do we do?”

With a grunt Anakin shoves himself onto his knees to better support his weight. “I can get through it,” he says. “Talk to him, find out where Padmé is.”

Anakin starts at Fox’s feet. He closes his eyes, sinks himself more completely into the radiating pain of the Living Force and uses it as a focus, prying the weakest tendrils away from Fox’s clammy skin and working upwards as quickly as he can. The mind control screeches at him with every anchor he rips away. It thrashes and scalds white hot, scouring along the edges of Anakin’s awareness until he’s bleeding and raw, and still he holds on. Both hands are freed, and then both of his arms, but the chest proves trickier when he has to extract thick, dripping pylons from the chambers of Fox’s heart. They explode in his hands, and distantly he hears the both of them yell out.

The remaining blanket of darkness around Fox’s mind swirls tighter and faster the closer he gets. Like a sentient vortex it spits and screams, flaying him wide open and rattling his teeth inside his skull. He feels the deaths of a hundred Jedi in the Temple, the suffering of a hundred younglings and the torture of every padawan for miles. Masters and Knights and _children,_ falling all across the galaxy.

He presses down and smashes through the blackened barrier with more force than he’s ever had finesse. 

Inside Fox’s mind is a howling hurricane of fear and anger and exhaustion. Anakin wrenches at the splintering pikes of Palpatine’s influence and wrenches them out, feeling the fury die to soul-deep pain with every one that goes. He finds the chip and cradles it, shocked to find it primed but inert. He supposes Fox state of near-unconsciousness has protected him from its deployment.

_“Fox!”_ Rex’s shout finally reaches his ears. Anakin comes back to himself slowly and carefully, intent to keep Fox awake and away from the chip as long as possible. He’s kneeling heavily on the floor with his arms outstretched as usual, and he can feel Rex has moved to support his brother.

“Rex?” Fox croaks weakly. “Rex, I—”

“Palpatine was controlling you,” Rex explains hastily. “General Skywalker’s getting him out. Can you hear me?”

“Loud and clear.” Fox coughs, unable to move well but held gently in Rex’s lap. “This, I—Rex, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I couldn’t fight him.”

“It’s not your fault Commander, it never was. We freed the Guard who came here, they’ll wake up soon. General Windu took his men to find Senator Organa, and we came here for Pad—for Senator Amidala. Do you know where she is, Fox? Do you know where we can find her?”

Anakin feels a flicker of pure horror spark over the surface of Fox’s mind and shies away from it.

“I do,” Fox whispers. “She’s in the Senate. Rex, she’s in the Senate, but you can’t go to her, they’ll kill you before you’ve even landed. She’s under—under all the men I could spare. Rex’ka, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.”

“Fox,” Rex pushes. “Fox, what’s happening, what’s going on?”

“You can’t go to her, vod, you can’t!” Fox chokes. “I can—I can find her. I promise. As soon as we clear out, I’ll find her, I’ll—” He pauses, and Anakin has to dodge another influx of emotions. Terror, disgust, nausea. _“Amidala.”_

“Fox, what is it?”

“Rex, I—Rex, she’s your Riyo. We took her for bait. She’s the bait, you can’t go. Skywalker _can’t go,_ you hear me?”

“I hear you, I hear you! When you wake up, take your men and get to Organa and the General, okay? Find—find Padmé and Riyo and get out of here, for me.”

Anakin feels Fox swallow and nod. A small breeze of certainty and calm scatters the violence of his emotions thinner, and Anakin can tighten his grip on the man’s consciousness.

“I left Skywalker’s weapon with her. Everything of his I had. Palpatine said… Wanted as much pain and suffering as we could. So many Jetiise, Rex, so many of them, and I—”

“Stop,” Rex says. He lays a hand over Fox’s unarmoured chest and presses gently. “Stop that. It wasn’t you, it was Sidious. We’re going to free you and then you’re going to get the hell out.”

Another nod. “Thank you. Thank you, and Skywalker.”

“We’re counting on you, Fox, and we love you. You hear? We need you to stay alive and get everyone out.”

“Understood.”

Anakin feels Fox slipping before he feels Rex start to panic. He closes his fist around the chip and snaps each connection, each synapse until it’s a useless slip of nerve tissue, and Fox can slink easily into sleep. And then he slumps over onto his side, exhausted, and squints open his eyes.

Rex wraps Fox more securely in Anakin’s cloak before lowering him to the floor beside the rest of the Guard. After a moment contemplating his brothers, he moves across the room to a floor panel under the coffee table and lifts it. Anakin knows what he’s doing, has watched him help Padmé stash their emergency supplies many times before, and smiles tiredly when he sees the spare DCs and holsters removed and set on the floor beside him. They’re followed swiftly by just over half of their ammunition store, one of Anakin’s Jedi robes and two special commission blastweave cloaks of Rex’s design. Padme’s, notably, is set on the table above. Half of the rations and medipack tins are tipped out into Rex’s hands and he begins stowing protein bars, bacta and bandages in pockets and his utility belt, wherever he can find space. He takes two empty water canteens and fills them in the room’s central fountain (always recycled but fresh and clean, at Padmé’s request). Half the bag of emergency credits is stored safely in his belt.

Anakin decides to leave him to it and actually try to do something constructive. He lifts himself from the floor on one shaking arm and one unresponsive, staggering on sore feet towards their bedroom. He kicks open the second emergency stash on his way in and spends a precious few seconds searching his nightstand for something to write on. He comes up with a few scraps of flimsi, a chewed stylus, and (thank _kriff)_ a spare mechanics kit for his arm, and sets to work scribbling a note with his off-hand.

_Feel free to take what you need, there’s a second store in the bedroom. Keep the senators safe. - Skywalker_

He shoves it in his belt and replaces the stylus before dragging himself over to where spare pairs of his boots are hidden in the back of Padmé’s wardrobe. He takes a tunic and jacket from the rack of barely-used civvies for Rex, throwing them over his shoulder while he sits on the floor to tug his shoes on. Artoo beeps softly from the doorway.

“Hey, we haven’t forgotten you, buddy,” he says. “We just have to move quickly, all right? We don’t want Palpatine to catch us or we won’t be able to save anyone at all.”

Artoo rolls forward and nudges his leg. Anakin sighs and leans against his cool metal casing. 

“Do you want to come with us, bud, or do you want to stay and look after Padmé for us? I’m sure the Commanders could use your help, and—” Artoo shrills indignantly and knocks against him, jolting his ribs where they’re growing tender bruises. “All right, all right, I’m sorry. Of course you can come. I’d feel better if Padmé had you, but…”

With an air of huffiness previously thought impossible for a droid, Artoo turns and trundles towards the refresher door. It opens at his proximity, and Anakin feels his eyebrows jump at the sight inside; Threepio, eyes dark, splayed clumsily across the tile. Artoo mutters lowly and extends a prod to switch his friend back on.

“Oh!” Threepio exclaims with a shock. He sits up quickly, head turning this way and that as he takes in his surroundings. “Artoo! What _took_ you so lo—oh, Master Ani! How much of a relief it is to see you. The troopers, they turned up at our door! They deactivated me, I didn’t have a _chance_ to defend my poor Mistress Padmé… Oh, what a failure I am, not even suited for the tasks of lowly servant droids…”

“That’s enough, Threepio,” Anakin says, getting back to his feet slowly. “You don’t need to blame yourself. The Chancellor’s taking over everything, and Padmé’s in trouble. I want you to go with Commanders Fox and Stone to find her and look after her, can you do that?”

“Oh, of course, Master Ani, of course!” Threepio chirps. “Anything for Mistress Padmé. Is Master Rex there? Am I to be accompanying you?”

Anakin sighs. “No. We have our orders from Master Windu and Commander Fox to leave. I don’t want to, but as long as we’re here no one will be safe from Darth Sidious. You need to go in our place and make sure she and the—the _baby_ are looked after.”

“Of course, sir, I’ll ready at once.”

Little gods, they’re leaving _the baby._

“Anakin?” calls Rex from the other room. Anakin gestures for Artoo and Threepio to follow him as he makes his way back through.

“Here,” he says, and holds out the clothes to Rex. “You’re going to need these when we need to hide.”

“Ah, thanks,” Rex says, but he looks hesitant as he examines the material in his hands. Anakin takes the note from his belt and leaves it atop Padmé’s cloak on the coffee table, hopefully where the troopers will see it when they wake.

“Artoo is coming with us.”

Artoo bleeps, and Rex breathes a weak laugh. 

All at once, gazing over the carbon-scored room and pile of knocked out troopers, reality seems to hit home. Anakin’s knees buckle again, sending him heavily to the floor. His com is gone, left with Padmé as Fox confessed. Rex’s is broken. Ahsoka maybe dead, Obi-Wan Force-knows-where. _Force-knows-where._ Anakin has no idea. _No idea,_ and it makes his breathing come shorter and faster and too, too erratic. 

No idea where his Master is, no idea where he’ll go. No idea what to do, where to hide, who to find. No way to reach anyone, no saber to fight with. He’s exhausted from overexertion, from the strain of the pain and the suffering and the sorrow and the stress, and his head is beginning to swim. He doesn’t know what to do, doesn’t know how he’ll ever find Obi-Wan or Padmé or Mace or Bail ever again. He has Rex, his love and his world even without Padmé, but in this drained state he’s only slowing them both down. Rex should leave him here, should write him off as useless and put a blaster bolt through his brain before Sidious can get him. Should run away from the pain and protect himself. If anyone can find the others it’s Rex.

Anakin only realises he’s panicking when rough hands close over his face and he’s brought abruptly down to ground by the searing pain in his chest and his sobbing, heaving breaths.

“—be fine, okay?” Rex’s voice floats through. “You hear me? Anakin? Anakin! Anakin, listen, _please!”_

Anakin blinks his eyes over and over, feeling trapped and useless to clear them of the well of tears. He lifts his hand weakly towards Rex’s wrist, failing and dropping it back down at barely half-way. He sobs another breath and it _hurts,_ but he deserves it; look what he’s done, what his ignorance and arrogance has caused. _He deserves it._

“No, you do _not.”_ Comes Rex’s voice again, firmer. A cool forehead touches his, a solid and grounding presence as Anakin lets his useless eyes slip closed once more. “Anakin, listen to me. We’re going to be fine. We’ll escape here and we’ll find them, Obi-Wan, Ahsoka, all of them, and we’ll find our Padmé in no time, okay? We’re not leaving anyone behind. We’ll make it, I _promise_ we’ll make it, but for now we need to go. Do you understand, Anakin? We’ll find them, but we need to go, _now.”_

Anakin sniffs and tries again to breathe, finding his throat less constricted and painful to use. He nods against Rex’s forehead, and Rex kisses him softly. Anakin’s fingers dig into his leg. He leans into Rex, into the press of soft lips against his own. He kisses him like it’s their last.

For all they know, it is.

“Come on,” Rex whispers when they part. Anakin can breathe again, but his chest still screams with the effort. “I’ve loaded the ship. Artoo’s already there.”

Anakin nods again. He opens his eyes when Rex helps him to his feet and slings Anakin’s arm over his shoulder. Anakin’s legs decide to cooperate, for the most part. He helps Rex get him down the steps to the landing arm and over the walkway, even managing to climb into the copilot’s cockpit without falling. He settles there, wallowing in pain and guilt and fear, and lets Rex strap him into things. Two holsters on his thighs, a blaster in each, and a sling for his aching arm. His spare cloak, heavy with blastweave and ration bars and bacta and his water canteen. Rex pulls him forward to wrap it securely around his shoulders until he feels swaddled and a darn sight warmer. Anakin helps clip his acceleration belt and smiles weakly as he’s graced with another soft kiss.

“Where to?” Rex asks him.

“Anywhere,” he replies. “Anywhere but here.”

“Outer Rim?”

Anakin thinks. They have the fuel. They’ll need more after they get there, but that’s manageable. Actually, they could probably do with a better ship. A small freighter, maybe, something to live on.

“Nar Shaddaa,” he murmurs. “Take us to Nar Shaddaa. They won’t find us there, not unless we want them to.”

“Yes, sir,” Rex says lightly, and Anakin watches him climb fluidly into the pilot’s seat. The sounds of engine prep and sealing transparisteel soothes the erratically spiking fear at the heart of Anakin’s mind. 

“Rest, Anakin,” Rex tells him over coms as they soar over the glimmering, shrinking ecumenopolis below. “I’ve got this one. Please, rest.”

Anakin closes his eyes, and rests.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for staying with me! We'll have more... soon. :) <3

**Author's Note:**

> Come cry with me about these guys over on [tumblr!](https://silverxsakura.tumblr.com/)


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